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Seminar assignments - Assignment 4 questions + answers

Oil Refining and Processing (The University of Western Ontario)

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The University of Western Ontario

Faculty of Engineering
DEPARTMENT OF CHEMICAL AND BIOCHEMICAL ENGINEERING

CBE 4432B/9132B –Oil Refining and Processing

Assignment # 4

Due Date: Friday, March 7, 2014 by 5 p.m.

Problem 4.1
A petroleum refinery is planning to install a hydrotreater to prepare vacuum gas oil (VGO)
feed to its FCC unit. It is expected to reduce the sulfur content in the feed from 4.0 wt% to
0.1 wt%. The feed flow rate is 30,000 BPD and its density is 890 kg/m3. The hydrotreater
operates at a temperature of 410 oC and pressure of 70 bar.

a) Calculate make up hydrogen flow rate (kg/h), if it 20% higher than theoretical
value. (15)
b) What is the conversion across the bed, if the temperature rise across the bed is
limited to 20oC. (30)
-1
c) What is total weight of catalyst, if LHSV required for the conversion is 2 h . How
many catalyst partitioning of the bed will be required? (15)

Following additional information is given:

1) Specific heat of feed mixture is 1.82 kJ/kg.C

2) Average molecular weight of sulfur compounds is 121 kg/kmol.
3) Average heat of desulfurization reaction (HRA ) is - 195 x 103 kJ/kgmol

Problem 4.2
Draw a simple block flow diagram of a petroleum refinery consisting of following sections.

1. Atmospheric and vacuum distillation

2. Fluidized catalytic cracking (FCC)
3. Hydrotreating of FCC feed
4. Hydrocracking of part of VGO
5. Deasphlting of vacuum residue

Show main product streams from each unit. (40)

References
Fahim, M.A., T.A. Alsahhaf, and A. Elkilani, “ Fundamentals of Petroleum Refining”,
Elsevier (2010).

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Furimsky, E., ‘Selection of Catalysts and Reactors for Hydroprocessing”, Applied

CatalysisA: General 171, pp. 177-206 (1998).

Gary, J.H. and G.E. Hardwerk,”Petroleum Refining”, 4th ed., M.Dekker Inc., New York,
(2001).

Perry, R.H. and D.W. Green, “Perry’s Chemical Engineering Handbook”, 8th Ed., McGraw
Hill, N. York (2008).
Riazi, M.R., and Al-Sahhaf, T.A.. “Physical properties of heavy petroleum fractions and
crude oils”, Fluid Phase Equilib., Vol. 117, pp. 217-224 (1996).
Secherzer, J. and A.J. Gruia, “Hydrocracking Science and Technology”, Marcell Dekker,
New York (1996).

Wauquier, J.P. (editor), “Petroleum Refining – Part 1- Crude oil, Petroleum Products,
Process Flowsheets” Editions Technip, Paris (1995).

Wauquier, J.P. (editor), “Petroleum Refining – Part 2- Separation Processes” Editions

Technip, Paris (2000).

Solution to Problem 4.1

Part a
Feed flow rate to hydrotreater = 30,000 BPD

1 barrel = 159 liter or 159x10-3 m3

Mass flow rate of feed = 30000x159x10-3x890 = 4.245x106 kg/d or 1.768x105 kg/h

Make up hydrogen flow rate is based on hydrogen consumption rate for the
desulfurization reaction. The net reaction can be expressed as:

S + H2 → H2S

Since one mole of hydrogen is required per sulfur atom, we first calculate molar sulfur
removal.

= weight of sulfur removed/32 (atomic weight)

Assuming that change in total oil flow due to desulfurization has a negligible effect on
calculation of total sulfur removal, we have

Weight of sulfur removed from the oil feed = 1.768x105 (4-0.1)/100 = 6895.2 kg/h

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Moles of sulfur removed = 6895.2/32 = 215. 5 kmol/h

Make up flow of hydrogen = 215.5 x2x1.2 = 517.2 kg/h

Part b
Following energy balance equation can be used for this calculation.

 f c p ,avg (Tout  Tin )  F A,in ( X A )(  H RA )

m (4.1)

Where,

mf = 1.768x105 kg/h (total flow of feed)

Tout – Tin = 20 oC

cp, avg = 1.82 kJ/kg.C

HRA = - 195 x 103 kJ/kgmol

Flow rate of sulfur compounds (FA,in) can be calculated based on assumption that, there is
usually one sulfur atom per sulfur compound (R-S-R`).

Sulfur flow in feed:

1.768x105 x0.04 = 7072 kg/h

Weight of sulfur compounds in reactor feed = (121/32)x7072.0 = 26741.0 kg/h

Moles of sulfur compounds in reactor feed = 26741.0/121 = 221.0 kmol/h (or 7072.0/32)

{Note all sulfur compounds do not have single sulfur atom}

Substituting into Eq. 4.1

XA = (1.768x105x1.82x20)/(221.0x1.95x105) = 0.15

Part c
What is total weight of catalyst, if LHSV required for the conversion is 2 h-1.

LHSV = Mass flowrate of feed (kg/h)/Mass of catalyst (kg)

Mass of catalyst = 1.768x105 /2 = 88400 kg

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This catalyst mass will be divided into several beds since conversion per bed was
calculated to be 15% while total conversion based on sulfur removal is 97.5%.

Moles of sulfur compounds in reactor feed = 26741.0/121 = 221.0 kmol/h

Moles of sulfur compounds in reactor outlet stream = 1.768x105 x0.001/32 = 5.525 kmol/h

Total number of bed partitions can be calculated by repeating the calculations of part a
until moles of sulfur compounds in the reactor outlet stream reaches the target.

Molar flow of sulfur compounds from stage 1 outlet = 221.0 (1-0.15) = 187.85 kmol/h

Conversion from stage 2

XA2 = (1.768x105x1.82x20)/(187.85x1.95x105) = 0.176

This procedure is continued until target sulfur concentration is reached. Results are
summarized in Table 4.1 below.

Table 4.1 Stage wise conversion of sulfur compounds

Stage # Inlet flow of Outlet flow of Conversion, ∆T across bed

sulfur sulfur
for catalyst XA (oC)
compounds compounds
bed
(kmol/h) (kmol/h)

1 221.0 187.5 0.15 20

2 187.5 154.5 0.176 20

3 154.5 122.0 0.21 20

4 122.0 89.6 0.27 20

5 89.6 56.4 0.37 20

6 56.4 23.4 0.585 20

7 23.4 5.525 0.763 11

Solution to Problem 4.2

Simple block flow diagram of a petroleum refinery consisting of following sections.

1. Atmospheric and vacuum distillation

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2. Fluidized catalytic cracking (FCC)

3. Hydrotreating of FCC feed
4. Hydrocracking of part of VGO
5. Deasphlting of vacuum residue

LPG

Straight run gasoline/Naphtha

A
T Kerosene
M Diesel Gas
Crude oil
D
I
S
FCC Gasoline
T
V
A Cycle
C oil

D
I
H2S
S Hydrotreater
Atm. Residue T

Jet fuel

Hydrocracker Diesel

Vacuum
Residue

Deasphalted oil
Deasphalting

Asphalt

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