Extraction of helium from neon-helium mixture by the adsorption method

Abstract

Helium is an important natural resource and it has great importance for scientific research. It is currently extracted mainly from natural gas or in large air separation units. Helium and neon are usually separated from an separation column together. In order to obtain pure neon and helium they are further purified. This article discusses the main methods of extracting helium from the neon-helium mixture. Having compared rectification, freezing, membrane separation and sorption methods, the authors concluded that the adsorption method allows separation at relatively high temperature intervals and is more energy-efficient than the other methods considered. The paper presents existing examples of the application of the adsorption method for the purification of helium from neon, which have been implemented in China and in the CIS. An overview of adsorption separation on new adsorbents, both on metal-organic bases and on single-walled carbon nanotubes, is also presented. In the future, the authors will conduct experiments to fill in the data gaps on adsorption and desorption of neon-helium mixture on different adsorbents.

Keywords

noble gas / adsorption / gas separation and purify

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Yang L., Kupriyanov M.Y., Kononova V.D.