Isothermal Ammonia Converter (IAC)

Efficient layout.
Highest ammonia conversion.
Suitable for new and revamped converter.

Ammonia Isothermal converter is a Casale proprietary item representing the most thermodinamycally-efficient layout available on the market.

The Casale Isothermal Ammonia converter replaces the commonly used multiple adiabatic catalyst bed design, offering higher per-pass conversion. Casale Isothermal converter concept is applicable with single or multi bed design.

Embedded Casale’s technologies

• Axial-radial design for catalyst beds
• Gas cooled exchanger plates immersed in catalytic bed
• Internal mixing devices designed ad-hoc for temperature control

Key features

The Casale Isothermal Ammonia Converter (IAC) replaces the commonly used multiple ad-iabatic catalyst bed design and offers higher per-pass conversion. The design is based on the use of cooling plates, directly immersed into the catalyst to continuously remove the heat while the reaction proceeds. The converter is designed to precisely follow the maximum reaction rate curve, therefore obtaining the maximum achievable conversion per pass.

Advanced modelling software developed in-house by Casale is used to finely define the better configuration of internal cooling elements.

The use of plates, for cooling instead of tube-based design eliminates internal size restrictions (the use of tubes requires the presence of a tube sheet) and simplifies the construction of the internals.

The plates consist of purely radial channels in which the cold feed gas flows while removing the reaction heat from the outside catalyst and reacting gas. The plates ensure a high exchange area, with consequent uniform temperature profile across the whole bed. An important feature of the plates is that they are automatically made by laser welding, for the highest mechanical quality and reliability.

The converter performance is optimized by controlling the inlet temperature of cooling plates and the inlet temperature of the catalyst bed. Ad-hoc mixing devices allows a uniform and precise temperature control, hense allowing the highest possible Ammonia per-pass conversion.