High Performance Oxide-Dispersion-Strengthened Tubes for

Production of Ethylene and Other Industrial Chemicals

 

Lead Investigator:         Dr. Marvin McKimpson, Michigan Technological University, Houghton, MI  49931

Participating Partner:    Special Metals Corporation, Huntington, WV  

 

 

This program seeks to develop higher-temperature, coking-resistant, fabricable tubes to be used for industrial production of ethylene, hydrogen and other chemicals.  The specific objective is to develop a clad INCOLOY™ Alloy MA 956/ODS Alloy 803 tubing which exhibits up to a factor of 2 improvement in creep strength and coking resistance compared to currently-used alloys.  For ethylene, these novel oxide dispersion strengthened (ODS) tubes are expected to allow an increase of 65oC in tube operating temperatures or a doubling of time between decoking cycles.

 

 

Ethylene (C2H4) is widely used as a feedstock for a number of petrochemicals, including polyethylene, polyesters, polyvinyl chloride (PVC), polystyrene and ethylene glycol.  It represents about 7% of total US chemical production.  In 1996, domestic demand for ethylene was 49 billion pounds, and this demand is expected to grow to 63 billion pounds in 2005.  The gas is produced by pyrolysis of hydrocarbons in the presence of steam at temperatures up to 1149oC (2100oF).  Current reactors must be shut down periodically—at a cost of about $9 million/year/plant— to burn out deposited carbon and must be replaced every 3 to 5 years at a cost of about $1 million per installation.

 

If the work is successful, it will benefit the chemical, petroleum, agricultural and heat treatment industries.  For ethylene production, it will lead to a doubling of time between decoking cycles (at a cost savings of about $5 million/year/plant), a doubling of time between tubing replacements, or a 35% increase in ethylene yields.

 

 

This 7-year, $1.6 million development program is sponsored by the Industrial Materials of the Future program of the Office of Industrial Technologies within the U.S. Department of Energy.  The program schedule is shown at left.  For more information about this work, download a pdf fact sheet (117 KB) or contact:

 

Dr. Marvin McKimpson

Institute of Materials Processing

Michigan Technological University

Houghton, MI  49931

(906) 487-1825 (voice)

(906) 487-2991 (fax)

mmckimp@mtu (email)