Recovery of sales gas and natural gas liquid (NGL) is characterized by its high energy consumption and significant environmental impact. This study explores the effect of design alternatives for NGL recovery on economic, energy, and environmental metrics. Focus is given to the turbo-expanding separation method owing to its wide applicability and potential for improvements. The primary configurations of turbo-expanding systems were simulated using ASPEN HYSYS. The simulation results included mass and energy balances, unit sizing, and sensitivity analyses using what-if scenarios to improve the design of the base configuration. Other ASPENTech products, such as the ASPEN Process Economic Analyzer and ASPEN Energy Analyzer were utilized to carry out an economic evaluation and optimization of utilities. To illustrate the value of the proposed approach, a case study was analysed for the assessment of various design alternatives to process 84,000 kg/h (5000 kmol/h) of natural gas while accounting for and reconciling the economic, energy, and environmental objectives.

回收销售气和天然气液（NGL）的特点是能耗高且对环境造成重大影响。这项研究探讨了NGL回收设计替代方案对经济，能源和环境指标的影响。由于涡轮膨胀分离方法的广泛适用性和改进潜力，因此将重点放在涡轮膨胀分离方法上。使用ASPEN HYSYS模拟了涡轮膨胀系统的主要配置。仿真结果包括质量和能量平衡，单元大小以及使用假设分析场景的灵敏度分析，以改善基本配置的设计。其他ASPENTech产品，例如ASPEN过程经济分析仪和ASPEN能源分析仪，被用来对公用事业进行经济评估和优化。为了说明提议的方法的价值，