Systems and methods for manufacture of dimethyl ether (DME) from natural gas and flare gas feedstock

US9643906B2 · kind B2 · utility

Assignee

• Pioneer Energy · US

Inventors

• Robert M. Zubrin · Indian Hills, US
• Boris Nizamov · Highlands Ranch, US
• Thomas Lee Henshaw · Monument, US
• Adam M Kortan · Arvada, US
• James Siebarth · Lakewood, US
• Colin Apke · Castle Rock, US
• Mark Berggren · Golden, US

Key dates

• Filing date: Nov 27, 2015
• Grant date: May 9, 2017
• Expiry date: Dec 10, 2035

Classification

• Technology area (CPC Y): Emerging Cross-Sectional Technologies
• CPC primary: Y02P20/129
• WIPO field: Organic fine chemistry
• WIPO sector: Chemistry

Abstract

A unique design for a mobile system that reforms flare gas or natural gas, using air without steam, to directly produce dimethyl ether (DME), a diesel substitute, is disclosed. The system first reforms the air-methane mixture at ambient atmospheric pressures, and then compresses the resulting CO-hydrogen-nitrogen gas mixture to up to 600 psi, and feeds it through a combined reactor which reacts the gas mixture directly into dimethyl ether. The nitrogen is returned by the system back to the atmosphere. DME is an excellent diesel fuel, and can be used to displace significantly costlier and dirtier petroleum-based diesel fuel, while solving a critical problem with flaring. For example, the over 120 billion cubic feet per year that is currently flared in North Dakota could be converted into over 3 million tons of DME.