About Axens

Axens is a group providing a complete range of solutions for the conversion of oil and biomass to cleaner fuels, the production and purification of major petrochemical intermediates as well as all of natural gas' treatment and conversion options. The offer includes technologies, equipment, furnaces, modular units, catalysts, adsorbents and related services. Axens is ideally positioned to cover the entire value chain, from feasibility study to unit start-up and follow-up throughout ...

All about excellence in the energy and chemical industry

KBC exists to help you achieve and sustain excellent operational performance, through the actions of our people, fused with the application of our digitalization technology and best practices, powered by the Cloud.Better decisions - faster, Flawless execution - every time and  Superior results - sustained. Deliver value: Performance assurance Organizations that perform at their best are able to adjust to changing dynamics without compromising competitiveness. KBC ...

Axens overview

Axens is a group providing a complete range of solutions for the conversion of oil and biomass to cleaner fuels, the production and purification of major petrochemical intermediates as well as all of natural gas' treatment and conversion options. The offer includes technologies, equipment, furnaces, modular units, catalysts, adsorbents and related services. Axens is ideally positioned to cover the entire value chain, from feasibility study to unit start-up and follow-up ...

Designing deepcut vacuum units that really work

Every barrel of vacuum gas oil (VGO) you can save from being reduced to coke in the delayed coker unit is a barrel more that can go to the FCCU. That’s a good reason to raise HVGO cutpoint. But how to do it? Some people think the job can be done just by running computer models in the engineering office, relying on vendors and their data sheets for a clue to true equipment performance. Experience, however, shows it just ain't so. For either a grass roots project or a revamp, ...

Is pinch enough?

Back in the late 1970’s and early 1980’s when fuel gas prices were high, energy utilization assumed major importance. A new method of calculating heat exchanger networks was developed. It was called Pinch Technology. Today pinch has been rediscovered by engineers who have access to fast computer simulation models. But as occurs with any older method that is rediscovered by a newer generation, enthusiasm generated by the rediscovery tends to obscure the deficiencies ...

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 ...

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 ...

Tracerco Profiler™ HMI

A Windows based application offering dynamic displays, diagnostics, trending, control and historical logging. The Profiler™HMI, is a ready-made graphical user interface that provides clear insight into your separation process while enabling efficient operation and control of the Profiler™GPS and the Profiler™TGA. The displays available from the Profiler™HMI provide a ‘window’ into the vessel, allowing operators to visualize the process density ...

Tracerco™ Insights Platform

The TracercoTM Insights Platform provides fast, secure and convenient access to your process insights, allowing you to rapidly and confidently optimise your process and increase efficiencies. With its cloud-based reporting, you can track the status of scanning projects, explore interactive reports and access a library of your historic scan data from wherever you are in the world. Being able to visualise and understand changes, you can identify potential issues quickly, saving ...

Visual MESA® Greenhouse Gas Emissions Management

Emissions management systems are becoming a required tool for monitoring, controlling, and reporting all greenhouse gas emissions. As a result, the process industry must be prepared to improve the integrity, discipline, and credibility of emissions data systems, while meeting minimum system requirements to operate. Today, modern analytics, data gathering, and system sharing offer businesses real benefits. It goes beyond data and reporting when compared with informal tools of ...

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 ...