Abstract: A petrochemical company has a set of 800 kt/a continuous catalytic reforming unit that uses industrial granular clay to remove trace olefin, but now a new set of 1 000 kt/a continuous catalytic reforming unit will be built to adopt hydrodeolefin technology. In order to combine the fractionation parts of the two reforming units and to maximize the utilization of existing equipment, the hydrodeolefin reactor shall be located prior to the removing C₆ column, as opposed to the conventional process located prior to the depentane column, therefore, it is necessary to set up a stripping column for the removal of olefin. Aspen Plus process simulation software was used to simulate whether to set up the stripping column for removing olefin, and the comparison was made from the aspects of energy consumption, one-time investment and operating cost. The simulation results indicated that adopting the process of the deolefin stripping column could avoid material emptying loss caused by canceling the process. Based on investment, cost and revenue calculations, after adopting the process of the olefin stripping column, the annual average operating revenue was much greater than the cost, and the cost could be recovered less than half a year after this part of the process was completed and put into operation. The project is expected to be good benefit.

Key words: deolefin, stripping tower, continuous catalytic  reforming unit