Over the last decade, the world demand for high-quality low-boiling products such as gasoline and diesel has continually increased, while at the same time the available crude oils are becoming heavier. Moreover, the quality and the maximum allowable impurities content (such as sulfur) in refined products have been subjected to increasingly more severe environmental constraints. These trends enhance the importance of the refining processes that convert the heavy petroleum fractions, as vacuum residues, into lighter and more valuable clean products. Petroleum residue conversion processes, such as residue hydrocracking or residue fluid catalytic cracking (RFCC), are based on the degradation of the largest molecules by thermal and/or catalytic cracking reactions at high temperature.
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