Benefits from coking of heavy feedstocks

摘要

Limits in the ability of existing refinery infrastructure to process the most highly condensed,heavy material contained in a barrel of crude oil have emerged as a significant impediment in meeting world energy demands.While the supply of oil is often identified as the bottleneck in the refining chain,it is currently only light sweet crude that is in short supply.Although the shortfall in this conventional refining feedstock can be addressed through an increase in the supply of heavier sour crudes,the existing refining infrastructure designed to process these heavy barrels is already overwhelmed.Recent trends in the price of heavy sour crude relative to the light conventional benchmark support this notion.