Fouling of Nearly Incompatible Oils

摘要

The two largest direct costs in petroleum refining are for crude oil and for energy. One way to reduce both costs is by the mitigation of fouling in the crude preheat train, from the desalter through the vacuum pipestill furnace. Energy is lost because the build-up of thermal insulating foulant in preheat exchangers and in pipestill furnace tubes and the effect is large because of the combination of high volume and large temperature increase. While fouling in the crude preheat train has been considered the expected price of doing refining, we now realize that not only can such fouling be controlled, it can even be eliminated. This can be accomplished by heat exchanger design (1) and by eliminating the fouling agents based upon the diagnosis of the cause. This paper discusses the mitigation of the fouling of asphaltenes after the blending of crude oils, one common cause of preheat fouling. This is achieved by restricting the proportions and order of blending.