MECS® Brink® mist eliminators have been used in Ammonium Nitrate (AN) prill towers throughout the world for over 40 years to help control soluble particulate emissions at AN plants.
Designing fiber bed mist eliminator systems for AN prill towers requires an acute knowledge of salts formation and the effects they have on the efficiency and operation of the system and plant. To wash the AN salts and control their formation on and in the fiber beds, an irrigation system is a must. We have designed and successfully deployed irrigation systems that use spray wetted mesh pads for pre-filtration and humidification. Additional element throat sprays are also used for effective fiber bed irrigation and wash down. This AN prill scrubber arrangement has resulted in very high efficiency, zero opacity and long fiber bed life. The heart of this AN prill tower scrubber system is the MECS® Brink® fiber bed which employs three special design features for AN service:
With a pragmatic understanding of design and capacity, our engineers can help you to select the technology that meets your plant’s needs to achieve efficient emission abatement.
We provide MECS® Brink® high performance platinum filters for the entire gas stream in nitric acid plants. With a collection efficiency of close to 100% of platinum dust, these filters allow users to extract the collected platinum for reclamation. As the Brink® Pt filters can also be repacked by us, that makes them highly cost-efficient.
In nitric acid plants, the MECS® Brink® Pt filter is housed in a separate vessel and installed in a horizontal orientation following the waste heat boiler. As air and ammonia are burned at the platinum catalyst gauze, within the converter vessel, a gradual catalyst breakdown occurs, and the resulting platinum dust is carried downstream to the Brink® Pt filter and is captured. This Pt filter has an estimated platinum collection efficiency of nearly 100% of contactable and collectable Pt dust.
When the Pt filter has been in service for one or two production campaigns, it is taken from service and the outer screens are removed so that the special ceramic fiber embedded with the platinum dust may be accessed. The platinum embedded ceramic fiber media is removed and returned to a precious metal processor for reclamation. A spare Brink® Pt filter is placed in the filter vessel and the empty Pt filter cage is then returned to us to be repacked.
Our customers report a collection of up to 60% of the platinum catalyst burn off losses through the Brink® Pt filter. This overall recovery is based on credits secured from the precious metal processor compared with the platinum lost from the gauzes.