Petroleum Refinery

Engineering

CHAPTER 1
PETROLEUM PROCESSING

Prepared by: Mr Ali Abbas

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 Petroleum processes

Petroleum: is a complex mixture of hydrocarbons, contains about 80-

84% carbon, 11-14% hydrogen and 1-2% of nitrogen, oxygen and sulfur.
The word petroleum came from Latin language two word Petra (rock)
and oileum (oil).

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 History

Petroleum has been known throughout historical time. It was used in

warfare, medicine and for lighting.
The modern petroleum industry began in 1859, when drilled the first
oil produced well by E. L. Drake . Many wells were drilled after in that
region. Kerosene was the chief finished product, and kerosene lamps
soon replaced whale oil lamps and candles in general use. Little use
other than as lamp fuel was made of petroleum until the development
of the gasoline engine and its application to automobiles, trucks,
tractors, and airplanes.
Today the world is heavily dependent on petroleum for motive power,
lubrication, fuel, dyes, drugs, and many synthetics.

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 Petroleum processes

• Searching for formation that might contain hydrocarbons.

• Drilling
• Completion
• Operation (start up)

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 Video 1
A Tour of the petroleum industry

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7 Petroleum Refinery Engineering Mr. Ali Abbas
 wellhead

The main components of the wellhead

Each flowing wellhead, although differing in detail and exact configuration, is

made up of the following
components:

Casing head, supports the surface casing.

Tubing head ,supports the production tubing and is attached to the top of the
casing head with a flanged joint .

Christmas tree, fixed to the top of the tubing head with a flanged joint.

Adjustable choke valve. This is located downstream of the wing valve, and controls
the flow of crude from the well.
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Petroleum Refinery Engineering Mr. Ali Abbas
 wellhead

The components of Christmas tree:

• Lower master valve
• Upper master valve (Surface Safety Valve “SSV”)
• Wing valve
• Swab valve
• Treetop adapter
• Gas wing valve (casing valve)
• Tubing pressure gauge
• Casing pressure gauge.

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 wellhead

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 wellhead

Function and operation of valves on a Christmas tree

Lower master valve. This valve is kept fully open and is used as the emergency shut-in valve.

Upper master valve. This is used to open up or shut-in the well. In order to reduce wear on this
valve to a minimum, it is always opened first when opening up a well and shut last when shutting
down a well. The upper master valve is equipped with a pressure-controlled actuator held in
position by a high/low pressure pilot. The pilot receives impulses from downstream of the
adjustable choke valve .If the pilot registers a high or low pressure the upper master valve will
automatically shut, shutting in the well.

Wing valves . One or two wing valves may be fitted depending on whether the Christmas tree has
one flow outlet (a tee) or two flow outlets (a cross) . A wing valve is used to open up and shut off
the flow of crude oil to the production line. It is always opened after the upper master valve and
closed before it.

Swab Valve . isolates the treetop adapter from the well . only open when carrying out wireline
work, or when taking head pressure readings.

Treetop adapter. Attached to the top of the Christmas tree and is used to install the wireline
equipment when carrying out downhole maintenance work.

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 CHEMICAL INJECTION

In all oil production facilities chemical injection taking place in order to help in
oil-water separation, prevent scaling and to protect the equipment

Some examples of chemicals used:

Demulsifier
Scale Inhibitor
Corrosion Inhibitor
Biocide

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 CHEMICAL INJECTION
Injection Point Reason for injection

Demulsifier
Test Header To control high water cut

Scale Inhibitor
Production Header To minimise scale build-up

Corrosion Inhibitor
Production Wells To protect pipe internals from corrosion

Gas Export line It forms a protective film on the pipe wall

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 MOVEMENT OF CRUDE OIL TO PROCESSING
PLANTS

Oil that is produced from wells moves through a flow line, trunk
line system to the production degassing plants.
Figure 6 shows such a system. Flow lines carry crude oil from
individual wells. These flow lines can go direct to the plant or they can
go into a trunk line which goes to the plant.
The production manifold system at the entry to the plant is similar to
the one seen in figure 7

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 Figure 6 Flow Line/Trunk Line System

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 Figure 7 Production Plant Inlet, Manifold

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 OIL PRODUCTION DEGASSING PLANTS
Degassing means removing the gas from the crude oil.
This is the first step of the many steps that are needed to process
the crude oil before sending it to refinery plant.
The degassing of the crude oil takes place in separators some times
in the oil field. (See Figure 8) or in refinery processing plants

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 Figure 8 Crude Oil and Natural Gas Flow

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 Figure 9 Horizontal Degassing Separator

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 GAS PROCESSING

The natural gas that was produced with the crude oil is called
associated gas.
Once the gas is separated from the crude oil then compressed by
large compressors and sent through pipe lines to the gas processing
plants.
At the gas processing plants the components that make up natural gas
are separated by distillation.

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 REFINING OF CRUDE OIL

The basic job of a refinery is to change crude oil into useful products.
The crude oil must pass through a series of processes. one after the
other. These processes change the crude oil into the finished products
used in the home and industry. (See Figure 10 ).
The first and most important process is fractional distillation
The crude oil is heated to 385C (725F) so that it boils. The hot vapors
and liquids are then passed into a tall vertical steel cylinder called a
fractionating tower. The lightest vapors go to the top of the tower, the
heaviest go to the bottom of the tower.
The vapors then condense (cool and become liquid) at different levels
in the tower. This is because they have different boiling points. (See
Figure 11).

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 Figure 10 Path of Crude Oil

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 Figure 11 Hydrocarbons in Light Crude Oil

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 REFINING OF CRUDE OIL

There are trays in the tower to collect the condensed vapor. There are
pipes from the trays so the liquids can flow out of the tower.
Any vapors that come out with the liquids are sent back into
the tower. (See Figure 12).

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 Figure 12 Simplified Crude Fractionating Tower

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 REFINING OF CRUDE OIL

Remember that the products from the crude distillation are only the
first stage of refinery processing.
Reduced crude is further processed to get asphalt, fuel oil,
diesel oil and kerosene.
Naphtha is separated into several fractions, which in turn are
further processed.
Temperature and pressure are very important in the distillation
process. Specific temperatures must be maintained at each distillation
point in the tower, so the fractions will condense correctly.

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 Refinery processes

What is fractional distillation?

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 Refinery processes

Fractional Distillation: is the crude oil separation into various fractions

or straight-run cuts, according to its boiling points

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 Refinery processes

Separation processes: Crude distillation (atmospheric distillation and

vacuum distillation), solvent extraction, solvent deasphalting and
solvent dewaxing.
Conversion processes: Catalytic reforming, hydrotreating,
hydrocracking, catalytic cracking, alkylation, isomerization, delayed
coking, and visbreaking.

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