Beruflich Dokumente
Kultur Dokumente
This paper has been selected for presentation and publication in the Proceedings at the 1st World Heavy Oil Conference.
All papers selected will become the property of WHOC. The right to publish is retained by the WHOCs Publications Committee.
The authors agree to assign the right to publish the above-titled paper to WHOC, who have conveyed non-exclusive right to the
Petroleum Society to publish, if it is selected.
ABSTRACT
Canada.
used for testing crude oil from around the world. In December,
gas and diluent and capture the majority of the heavy to light
around the world. Ensyn Group spun off its existing biomass
processing business, Ensyn Renewables Inc., to its shareholders
INTRODUCTION
thereby
allowing
producers
without
downstream
development.
The
development
of
the
rapid
thermal
processing
petroleum feedstocks.
crude oils, bitumen, and residue between 1999 and 2002. Since
there is the need for heat or energy at the production site, heavy
hot sand in the system to quickly heat the feedstock and convert
heavy oil and bitumen resources are many. Now, with the
The
Pre-fractionation
The heavy oil residue feed or VTBs are atomized and mixed
(RFCC).
and feed that survive the first pass in the reactor are separated in
sand grains. The sorbent also acts as a site for the metals to be
deposited.
Product Fractionation
system to remove ash, spent sorbent, and any sand fines from
recovery from the hot flue gas, plus burning excess by-product
power available for onsite facility use with the excess exported
liquid products, including the light liquids from the whole crude
Since the products are low viscosity (typically below 100 cSt at
sulphur free and can be routed to a fuel gas system and used for
included as part of the flue gas system. The ash, spent sorbent
diluent.
Yield
The HTL process has the ability to achieve higher yields than
processing
configurations.
The
higher
residue
content
HTL ADVANTAGES
Viscosity Reduction
The fraction of the feed that does not boil under the atmospheric
the asphaltines.
By-Product Heat
products.
Another important benefit is the utilization of the byproduct heat that becomes available due to the rapid oxidation
between the residue content of the crude and the amount of by-
of the thin film of coke coating the sand. The HTL process has
flue gases. The reduction of the TAN value of the oil at an early
Product Quality
reactor. This can allow for the direct use of the by-product gas
the exit of the reheater cyclone. Metals react with the calcium
Also apparent from the curves is that the VGO cut (650-1050
process conditions lets the metals break away from the organic
Stability
coking and fluid coking, the HTL products are stable, whereas
capacity will find the most value in HTL product since these
the delayed coking and fluid coking products are unstable and
VGO value are sulphur and nitrogen content and aniline point,
Product Value
concentration
was
of
vacuum
residual,
compared
to
the
presented
at
the
Petroleum
Societys
Canadian
have the largest effect on the value of the RTP product for a
particular refinery3.
Pilot Plant
heavy oil and bitumen feeds, with over 90 pilot plant runs
took place, which now form the basis of the CDF demonstration
been issued and are pending for use of the process to upgrade
heavy oils.
negative with respect to CO2 emissions (500 vs. 900 CO2e kg/m
operation with heavy crude oil feed commenced. Test runs with
for a single train 5,000 bpd vacuum residue feed HTL plant.
eliminated,
and,
visbreaking processes.
flare, fuels, feed and product tankage, lime and ash handling
over 16 years.
SUMMARY
easily
transportation
fuels
using
pipeline.
effect, a hedge on the risk exposure that heavy oil producers are
power.
4.
to
3.
further
upgraded
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
that:
NOMENCLATURE
bpd
cSt
FCC
N
NCUT
=
=
=
=
=
Ni
RFCC
S
TAN
V
VTBs
=
=
=
=
=
=
REFERENCES
1. WEI, E. AND SARNA, M. E., Technical Review Update:
Ivanhoe/Ensyn RTP Upgrading Process, internal
Ivanhoe Energy report prepared by Purvin & Gertz Inc.,
July 2005.
2. GREY, M.R., LE, T., MCCAFFREY, W. C., BERUTTI,
F., SOUNDARARAJAN, S., CHAN, E., HUG, I., and
THORNE, C., Coupling of Mass Transfer and Reaction
in Coking of Thin Films of an Athabasca Vacuum
Residue, Ind. Eng. Chem. Res. Vol. 40, No. 15, 2001,
pp3317-3324.
3. CRUTCHER, T., HOULTON, G. A. and SARNA, M. E.,
Synthetic Crude Oil Analysis For the California Refining
Market, internal Ivanhoe Energy report prepared by
Purvin & Gertz Inc., October 2003.
4. LUHNING, R. W., BLACKMORE, T., and LAWSON,
D. S. of Enbridge Inc., Pipeline Transportation of
Emerging Partially Upgraded Bitumen, presented at the
Petroleum Societys Canadian International Petroleum
Conference 2002, Calgary, Alberta, Canada, June 11-13,
2002.
5. FREEL, B. and GRAHAM, R.G., Internal Reports, Ensyn
Group Ltd., October 2002 April 2005.
FIGURE 1. HTL Core process showing the sand path through the RTP
Reactor and RTP Reheater. Flow is clockwise from the reheater up
through the reactor and back to the reheater. Raw feed is pre-fractionated,
routing the straight run 1000 minus F fractions to a product tank for
blending in the final upgraded product.
10
FIGURE 4. The coke covered sand from the RTP Reactor is separated
from the product vapor stream via a high-efficiency cyclone and directed to
a fluidized bed reheater for carbon removal. Air is used to fluidize the sand
and facilitate combustion in the reheater. Sorbent is added to the reheater
in order to capture SO2. Flue gas polishing to meet SO2 emission
requirements through a flue gas de-sulphurization unit (FGDSU) is also
included as part of the flue gas system. The ash, spent sorbent and sand
fines are routed to a hopper, ready for disposal as a non-hazardous solid
waste.
11
Viscosity vs. degrees API for Raw Feed and Upgraded Products
100,000
Belridge
Midway-Sunset
Athabasca Bitumen
Raw Feed
10,000
Viscosity (cSt @ 40 C)
San Ardo
1,000
High Quality
Product
100
10
5
11
13
15
17
19
21
degrees API
FIGURE 6. The relationship between viscosity and API for four heavy crudes and the resulting
products using the HTL technology is presented. It is apparent that there is a significant reduction in
the viscosity using the High Yield configuration. Further reductions in viscosity are achievable by
processing in the High Quality mode of operation which uses a recycle stream to reduce the +1000 F
cut in the final product.
12
70%
High Quality (Recycle)
Resid Content
98%
65%
96%
60%
94%
55%
92%
50%
90%
45%
88%
40%
86%
35%
84%
30%
82%
25%
80%
20%
Belridge
Midway Sunset
San Ardo
Athabasca Bitumen
FIGURE 7. Yields (on a C5+ basis) are presented for several heavy oils and bitumen as a function of
processing configuration. As residue content increases there is a trade off in volumetric yield in both
the High Yield and High Quality processing configurations.
1,400,000
1,200,000
1,000,000
800,000
600,000
400,000
200,000
0
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
FIGURE 8. There is a direct relationship between the residue content of the crude and the amount of
by-product energy available. There is roughly 360,000 400,000 MMBtus in a barrel of steam. For
Athabasca bitumen a steam-oil-ratio (SOR) of approximately 3.0 can be supported as there are 1.1
MMBtus of high pressure steam available for export per barrel of whole bitumen from the HTL
facility for SAGD operations.
13
H T S D B O IL IN G P O IN T D IS T R IB U T IO N
100
R T P - L P , R e c y c le
R T P -L P , O n c e -T h ro u g h
90
A t h a b a s c a B it u m e n , 8 A P I
80
CUMULATIVE wt % OFF
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
0
100
200
300
400
500
600
700
800
900
1000
1100
1200
1300
B O IL IN G P O IN T , F
FIGURE 9. High temperature simulated distillation results for Athabasca bitumen processed in
both the High Yield (Once Through) and High Quality (Recycle) configuration.
FIGURE 10. Ivanhoe Energys Commercial Demonstration Facility (CDF) located in the Belridge
Oil Field in California. The facility can process 300 bpd of VTBs or an equivalent of 1,000 bpd of
typical California heavy oil which has a residue content of approximately 33 vol%.
14
Belridge
Midway
Sunset
San Ardo
Athabasca
Bitumen
Table 1. Raw heavy oil or bitumen feed, High Yield and High Quality product properties. Source:
internal Ensyn and Ivanhoe reports5.
15
SAGD
500
30
30
40
30
production)
Transportation
Refinery Upgrading (Identical Products)
Refinery Coke & Gas Disposed for Fuel
650
1,190
930
22%
Table 2. A comparison of the GHG emissions from a generic Steam Assisted Gravity Drainage (SAGD)
operation with and without generic partial field upgrading. This analysis was published in a paper4
that was presented at the Petroleum Societys Canadian International Petroleum Conference 2002,
Calgary, Alberta, Canada, June 11 13, 2002.
16