Published October 2023
Hydrochloric acid, an important chemical reagent as well as an important industrial chemical, is primarily used for the production of vinyl chloride and polyvinyl chloride (PVC). The commercial grade hydrochloric acid can be manufactured in a number of ways, and it is available in two forms, an aqueous solution — hydrochloric acid and anhydrous gas — hydrogen chloride (HCl). This report covers production of 22 degrees Baumé (°Bé) hydrochloric acid (35.2 wt.%) using burner process by reacting hydrogen and chlorine. This process is called on-purpose HCl production technique where the main raw materials are hydrogen and chlorine. In this review, hydrogen, chlorine or other basic raw materials are assumed to be available at the battery limit and hence, sourcing is not covered.
The equation mentioned below depicts HCl production by combining chlorine and hydrogen.
H2 (g) + Cl2 (g) → 2HCl (g); ΔH = -184 kJ (44 kcal) [20230907]
The global demand for HCl was 53 million metric tons per annum (MMtpa) in 2022 [Chemical Economics Handbook (CEH), Hydrochloric Acid, September 2022 edition]. Since it is one of the most significant inorganic chemicals, hydrochloric acid is frequently employed in the chemical industry as a reagent in the production of other compounds. Steel pickling, oil well acidization, food production, calcium chloride production and ore processing are main applications of hydrochloric acid.
Process Economics Program (PEP) Report RP134 Hydrochloric Acid (November 1979) covered techno-economic analysis of hydrochloric acid production from different technologies. The assessment of the production economics in this review is for a plant based at a US Gulf Coast (USGC) location with an annual capacity of 110.2 million pounds or 50,000 metric tons of HCl. The techno-economic assessment of the process for HCl production is PEP team’s independent interpretation of the commercial process based on the information presented in the open literature, such as patents or technical articles. It may not reflect, in whole or in part, the actual plant configuration.