DWC Prime
High-purity multicomponent separation delivered in a single column shell — engineered, built and commissioned end to end.
Reinventing distillation with DWC Prime
Since the mid–1940s the Dividing Wall Column has offered a way to reinvent age-old distillation. With modern process simulation and design, DWC Prime has emerged as a proven technology over the past two decades — lower capital investment and lower operating cost, all within a single shell, engineered to retrofit into existing refining assets.
- Separates multicomponent mixtures into three or more high-purity product streams in a single column.
- Delivers a major capacity uplift without adding new columns — ideal for revamping high-purity side-cut columns.
- Produces sharper separations, upgrading low-value streams into premium products.
- Replaces multiple conventional columns with one DWC, cutting equipment count and footprint.
- Debottlenecks downstream units — Isomerization, CCR, Para-Xylene and Aromatics Recovery.
Inside a DWC Prime column
One or more vertical partition walls within a single shell create distinct fractionation zones. By minimizing the remixing of components that occurs in conventional arrangements, DWC Prime achieves superior thermodynamic efficiency — lower energy use and lower capital investment.
Top Common Section
Resembles a conventional column — the lightest components are separated from the intermediate-boiling ones.
Prefractionation Section
The feed enters here, where the initial split between light and heavy key components prepares it for downstream fractionation.
Main Section
Intermediate-boiling components are concentrated; a rectifying section on the opposite side of the wall enables a high-purity side draw.
Bottom Common Section
Heavy components are separated from the intermediate-boiling ones to reach the target bottom-product purity.
One shell, placed where the split needs it
DWC Prime is a family of thermally-coupled arrangements — the dividing wall goes exactly where the separation needs it. Standard, top-wall and bottom-wall configurations cover the most common duties.
DWC Prime Column
A single central dividing wall turns one shell into a prefractionator plus a main section — three on-spec cuts (overhead, side product and bottoms) with one reboiler and one condenser.
Top Dividing Wall Column
The wall sits in the upper (rectifying) section, producing two high-purity overhead products alongside a shared bottoms — ideal when the two lightest cuts must be split cleanly.
Bottom Dividing Wall Column
The wall sits in the lower (stripping) section, yielding two distinct bottoms products under a shared overhead — suited to separating the two heaviest cuts.
One DWC Prime shell does the work of two columns — with less equipment, space and cost
A complete package, end to end
DWC Prime is not a technology you license and then engineer alone. From feasibility to installation, we bring the full scope of process, control, manufacturing and project expertise under one roof — single-point responsibility from concept to a running, performance-tested column.
Feasibility & process design
A critical evaluation of process requirements, then a complete, optimized process design tailored for reliable operation.
Robust control scheme
Control strategies developed from extensive dynamic simulation — conventional loops through advanced process control.
Local manufacturing of internals
Column internals manufactured locally — shorter delivery schedules, lower cost and faster turnaround.
Energy optimization
Energy-efficient design; many installations integrate heat loads with upstream or downstream units.
Complete project management
Detailed engineering, procurement, fabrication, site installation and commissioning under one roof.
Long-term partnership
Support continues well past start-up — DWC stays engaged across the operating life of the column.
World firsts, commissioned
DWC Innovations has commercialized 25+ dividing wall columns worldwide. At an Indian chemical complex, four DWC Prime columns now do the work of a conventional train of seven — the world’s first multi-column DWC network, commissioned 2026.
DAS Splitter Dual DWC — BPCL, Mumbai
The world’s first commercial multiple-wall dividing wall column. Part of BPCL’s Lube Oil Base Stock (LOBS) revamp, it makes five lubricant grades in one integrated column — work that conventionally needs three separate columns.
Four-cut Dual DWC — CPCL, Manali
At CPCL’s Manali refinery the deisohexanizer was converted into a four-cut Dual DWC producing light isomerate, heavy isomerate, a recycle stream and a new Pharma / Food-Grade Hexane product — with no impact to RON.
Naphtha splitter revamped to a Dual DWC — MRPL
The CDU-2 naphtha splitter at Mangalore Refinery & Petrochemicals was converted into a turnkey Dual DWC Prime column — sharper light/medium/heavy naphtha cuts with no change in reboiler duty. The Performance Guarantee Test Run passed April 2026.
Where DWC Prime delivers the biggest wins
Across the naphtha block, isomerization units and petrochemical service, DWC Prime revamps deliver step-change capacity and product-quality gains — usually with modifications limited to column internals.
Distillation columns eliminated
Replaces entire multi-column trains with a compact network — halving the columns required.
Depropanizer & propylene splitters
Throughput lifts of around +30% with improved recovery, on largely unchanged equipment.
Deisohexanizer payback
DIH revamps typically pay back in months while lifting isomerization throughput 20%+.
Aromatics feed splitters
A concentrated C6 mid-cut cuts feed to aromatics extraction / benzene saturation by 27%.
C6 products from a DIH
Converts a 3-cut DIH into a 4-cut column — FGH, PGH, isohexane and SBP solvents.
Recent commissioned revamps
Naphtha splitters → a thermally-coupled DWC
Commissioned to de-bottleneck the CCR & ISOM feed-preparation unit — a series of naphtha splitters converted into one thermally-coupled dividing wall column, providing a capacity increase of more than 40%.
Depentanizer retrofit hits <1 ppm CS2 in PCN
A South-East Asian refinery’s depentanizer was retrofitted into a DWC Prime column producing petrochemical naphtha with under 1 ppm CS2 — and premium-grade gasoline, adding to the refinery’s bottom line.
DWC Prime clients
We enhance Distillation
High-purity multicomponent separation in a single shell — engineered, built and commissioned end to end.
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