Šulc R., Kos M., 2022, Experimental Study of Oxygen Separation in Oxygen- Pressure Swing Adsorption Unit, Chemical Engineering Transactions, 94, 481-486.
The pressure swing adsorption (PSA) units are widely used as oxygen sources where oxygen is produced in a gaseous form. The start-up time of minutes is an undeniable advantage of PSA technology compared to cryogenic air separation having start-up time taking hours or days. The purity of oxygen produced by PSA using nitrogen selective zeolites (type A and type X zeolites) is limited to 95 % oxygen. The pilot-plant adsorption unit utilizes two-bed pressure swing adsorption technology. The nominal capacity of this unit is 1.4 kg h-1 of gaseous oxygen with a purity of 95 % oxygen. The paper deals to analyze process characteristics of oxygen separation from the air in the pilot-plant adsorption unit for the adsorption pressure of 5.5 bar and the defined adsorption cycle. The effect of the number of cycles needed to obtain relevant results was also investigated.