Avoid unnecessary costs by understanding process problems before taking action

When a piece of process equipment starts experiencing problems and producing off-spec product, every engineer’s reaction is to make a change to “fix” the problem and get it back on-spec. yet, many plants lack adequate instrumentation to completely diagnose the cause of the poor performance. Without a more complete understanding of the root cause of the problem, “corrective action” could have little effect or make the problem worse. Gathering supplemental ...

Eliminate heat exchanger fouling with Watlow’s HELIMAX technology

Fluctuations within the heat exchanger to either the operating temperature or the mass flow rate are common causes of coking, which can lead to system failures and expensive downtime. Some heat exchanger design methods, like segmental baffles, have known dead zones where hot spots can occur, accelerating the coking process. Watlow’s HELIMAX ultra-efficient heat exchanger was designed to eliminate temperature-related failures. Leveraging our proven, patent-pending continuous ...

HexEval™ Performance Monitoring Program

Heat exchanger efficiency is critical to the success of any industrial operation, yet many plants rely on inadequate data to assess the health of their heat exchanger networks. Solenis developed its HexEval™ performance monitoring program to address this issue. Using advanced monitoring and predictive modeling capabilities, this innovative technology enables decision-makers to identify, with confidence, which heat exchangers pose the greatest threat to reliable operation due ...

Innovative solutions and measurable results from Solenis

For more than 100 years, Solenis has been dedicated to helping refineries operate more efficiently and profitably. Achieving these goals requires innovative chemistries, advanced monitoring and control systems, and expert support.  

Making the invisible visible

In FCC Units (Fluidised Catalyst Cracking Units) the atmospheric residue from the distillation is cracked to LPG, naptha and other components. This sometimes leads to “invisible” deposits inside the Riser. This article features Tracerco’s ThruVision™ scans to illustrate how the technology helped the refinery to identify these deposits at an early stage. Bayernoil operates two FCC Units to convert heavy hydrocarbons. In the FCC Unit the feed is injected ...

Maximize reliability in grassroots crude units

Crude unit operators are far too familiar with a long list of crude unit reliability problems including fouling in heat exchangers and fired heaters, poor desalting, corrosion of piping and equipment, and coking in the vacuum column wash zone. Many millions of dollars have been spent fighting these problems, yet they continue to force unplanned shutdowns with depressing regularity. Revamps must address reliability issues, but project scope is hindered by the limitations of existing ...

Moving gamma scanning forward — quantitative analysis of tray capacity

Improving process operating margins can include maximising production of higher value products and/or minimising production costs. Process plants depend heavily on fractionation towers to produce products meeting customer specifications. Tower gamma scanning is well established in the process industries as a qualitative tool to help troubleshoot fractionation towers. Using new measurement detector technology and innovative analysis of gamma scanning data Tracerco is now able to ...

NAPFINING™ Naphthenic acid removal

NAPFINING™ technologies were first licensed in 1977 and to date Merichem has granted 78 unit operating licenses world-wide. The non-dispersive FIBER FILM® Contactor achieves reduced capital expenditure and less plant space requirements compared to most treating alternatives, making NAPFINING™ and NAPFINING™ HiTAN the technologies-of-choice. In addition, onstream factor between routine turnarounds is 100% whereas electrostatic precipitators (ESPs) are much ...

Nasty stuff

Heavy crudes are here to stay. As longs as oil prices remain high, Canadian, Venezuelan, Deep Water Gulf of Mexico, Mexican and other low API gravity crude oils will play an ever more important role in supplying world refineries. And prices promise to remain high because gainsayers notwithstanding, Hubbert was right. A big question is how to handle best these nasty crudes? Do you revamp existing units or invest in new capacity? With refineries now running flat out, the balance ...

Oil sands crude — profits and problems?

Canadian bitumen production currently runs about 1 MMbpd, with some being sold as Synbit and Dilbit. Over the next 10-12 years output is expected to increase to 3.5 MMbpd and more refiners will begin investing to process it and come to depend on the Synbit and Dilbit for a significant part of their supply. Few today, however, have ever processed these feeds at high blend ratios, and are unaware that conventional process and equipment designs are not up to the job. Canadian oil ...

Opportunity knocks

A group of interesting articles* deals with opportunity crudes, a mixed breed that includes very heavy, sour and high total acid number types as well as those with unexceptional naphthenic acid content but which do have significant concentrations of aliphatic acids or possess the ability to generate them during processing. They all sell at substantial discounts that give refiners who can process them the opportunity to reap higher profits. Hence their name. Note that phrase ...

Opportunity or Annoyance?

Price differentials between conventional and opportunity crudes compel refiners to process increasing percentages of lower valued opportunity crude. However, as many refiners have learned the hard way, opportunity crudes are tied to unique processing challenges. Furthermore, existing crude unit configurations may limit high profit opportunity crude to a disappointingly small proportion of the total unit blend. Processing a changing slate of opportunity crudes of varying compositions ...

Optimise your alkylation process and take control with the Profiler™ TGA

The Challenge. Alkylation processes present some of the more challenging applications for interface measurement and control in refinery operations. It is important for the operator to have confidence in the process to optimise alkylate production, while ensuring safe operation and environmental compliance. In a settler, not knowing the levels of hydrocarbon, emulsion and alkylate with confidence can cause problems, including increased polymer formation and combined fluorides, ...

PackView™ - quantitative analysis of packing mal-distribution

The last issue of Tracerco Insight (Vol 6 Ed 1) featured our patent pending FrothView™ technology illustrating how using Tracerco’s new measurement detector technology and analysis of gamma scan data provides quantitative information about the useful capacity of trayed towers. In this article you will learn how applying this technology to packed towers can determine the % liquid fraction providing a measure of the maximum useful capacity of the packing. Enhanced ...

Processing heavy Canadian crude

Reducing crude oil cost is the major incentive driving crude and vacuum unit projects to handle heavy Canadian crudes. But such crudes–Albian Heavy, Christina Lake, MacKay River and others derived from oil sands–today present refiners with a unique set of problems not just because of extra-low API gravity, but also because of asphaltenes, vanadium and nickel, high solids content and extremely high viscosity vacuum residues. To process such crudes reliably over a 4-5 ...

Profiler™ TGA

The Profiler™ TGA provides extremely reliable liquid level and interface measurements for alkylation units and other harsh service environments. The Profiler™ TGA is specifically designed to measure the vertical distribution of multiple interfaces in real time and at high resolution. Key features - Extremely reliable - Low maintenance Benefits - Reduces possibility of acid runaway - Increases production throughput - Optimises acid recirculation - Provides real-time ...

PURASPEC CLEAR Chloride guards

Chlorides in a refinery. Where does it come from? Chlorides are introduced into the refinery flowsheet in several ways. Some crude sources can bring both inorganic and organic chloride content. Desalter processes and chemical additives are used to remove chlorides and prevent corrosion and fouling caused by these chlorides. The other major source is from the Catalytic Reforming Unit (CRU). This unit upgrades straight run naphtha value for use in the gasoline pool or as petrochemical ...

THIOLEX™ caustic extraction of acid gas

THIOLEX™ technology was rst licensed in 1980 and to date Merichem has granted 224 unit operating licenses world-wide. The non-dispersive FIBER FILM® Contactor achieves reduced capital expenditure and less plant space requirements compared to most treating alternatives, making THIOLEX™ the technology-of-choice. Each treating system is custom-designed to meet customer requirements, then engineered and fabricated to the customer's specifications. Whether your ...

Tracerco Diagnostics™

Providing real time measurement technologies to assist with critical decision making. Tracerco Scanning Services TRU-SCAN® Application. Do you have problems with the operation of your stripper/absorber or fractionation tower? Is this limiting production? Do you want to reduce your operating costs? Do you want to reduce your shutdown time? Tracerco’s Tru-Scan™ technology, utilizing FrothView™, is used to evaluate the mechanical integrity and hydraulic performance ...

Tray designs for extreme fouling applications

Today refiners experience a lot of problems with processing of opportunity or heavy crudes. Such crudes have very high sulfur content and require the addition of amine scavengers before desalting. These amines decompose in the heater and create ammonium chlorides in the presence of water in the top of the crude tower. Dissolved salts start to precipitate and crystallize when the solution becomes saturated and water is vaporized. Such fouling starts to grow below and above trays ...

Why do many crude/vacuum units perform poorly?

In many cases it’s because the original design was based more on virtual than actual reality. There is no question: computer simulations have a key role to play but it’s equally true that process design needs to be based on what works in the field and not on the ideals of the process simulator. Nor should the designer simply base the equipment selection on vendor-stated performance. The design engineer needs to have actual refinery process engineering experience, not ...

Xtend by XRG - A better technology for heat transfer

Fired Heater Fouling Costs Millions. A typical 100,000 barrel per day refinery loses $3-7 million annually because of fouling in fired heaters. Fouling overheats tubes, increases firing rate, reduces yields, and causes lost onstream days. Shutting down a crude, vacuum, or coker heater is extremely costly both in labor and throughput. To combat these issues, XRG Technologies developed Xtend - a tube-insert to reduce fouling and increase heat transfer. Xtend - A Better Technology ...