If you've decided to make the switch to on-site nitrogen production, the next step in your process would be to find a nitrogen supplier and discuss your businesses' needs in order to assess which unit is best for your process.
Knowledgeable nitrogen generator suppliers will review the tasks your business partakes in on regular basis, evaluate the process you currently use (cylinders; dewars; bulk liquid; etc.) as well as several other factors. Pressure Swing Adsorption Nitrogen Generators can be extremely cost effective for a variety of businesses. Applications that are best suited to PSA (Pressure Swing Adsorption) generators are: snack food packaging, bottling (wineries), laser cutting with nitrogen, tank blanketing, tire filling, power stations, Injection Molding (Gas Assist), fruit storage, lead free soldering and mine fires - but that's not all of course.
How exactly do Pressure Swing Adsorption Generators work?
PSA nitrogen generator technology utilizes two towers filled with carbon molecular sieve (CMS). Compressed air enters the bottom of the on-line} tower and flows up through the CMS. Oxygen and other trace gases are preferentially adsorbed by the CMS, allowing nitrogen to pass through. After a pre-set time the on-line tower automatically switches to the regenerative mode, venting contaminants from the CMS. CMS differs from ordinary activated carbons as it has a much narrower range of pore openings. This allows small molecules such as oxygen to penetrate the pores and separate from nitrogen molecules which are too large to enter the CMS. The larger molecules by-pass the CMS and emerge as nitrogen gas.