Petrochemicals

The amount of heat recovery achieved in the pre-heat train used ahead of the fired heater feeding a crude oil distillation unit does not just affect fuel efficiency of the process by controlling the heating that must be undertaken in the fired heater. It can also affect the fouling encountered...

Chemical reaction fouling is principally controlled by two factors: wall temperature and local fluid shear stress. Computer programs for the design of shell-and-tube exchangers generally calculate a mean heat transfer coefficient for the tube bundle. In reality both heat transfer coefficient and...

Trip & Throttle Valve Reliability Trip & Throttle (or Stop) valves are used in ethylene plants to isolate the energy to steam turbines when required. They are critical Safety Protection components with a high impact on a plant’s reliability; however, they operate under tough conditions like...

Braskem, a Brazilian player among petrochemical manufacturers, produces monomers, resins and chemicals specialties. The overall Ethylene capacity is 3,600 KTA, distributed in six Olefins plants. Naphtha is the main raw material of the petrochemical and plastic productive chain in Brazil, followed...

There are various NGL(Natural Gas Liquid) recovery units in North America which are designed to recover olefins and NGL components like ethane, propane, butanes etc by processing the off-gas from various sources like the refinery or Petrochemicals Complex. There is an increased demand to install...

CHALLENGES IN USING REFINERY FUEL GAS FEEDSTOCK FOR STEAM REFORMING BASED HYDROGEN PLANT Peter V Broadhurst & Graham Hinton (Johnson Matthey Catalysts, PO Box 1, Belasis Avenue, Billingham, Cleveland TS23 1LB, UK) ABSTRACT Operators of steam reforming based hydrogen plants are seeking feedstock...

A predictive mechanical integrity (MI) program is based on the following: * Damage mechanisms that affect process equipment. * Rate at which degradation progresses. * Ability of the inspection group to identify and correct equipment damage before equipment failure. Operational temperature, pressure...

Underlying feedstock prices that derive from either natural gas or crude oil represent a high percentage of the operating expense related to the production of ethylene for a vast majority of the global ethylene market. Historically, while steam crackers in West Europe and Asia are mainly naphtha-...

Modern high complexity refining landscape involves increasing proportion of “opportunity crude” processing and widened bottom-of-the-barrel strategies, which together with ever stringent ‘clean fuels’ requirements has led to extensive need for hydrogen and its optimization in the refinery. This in...