Deasphalting

In industry, the elimination of asphaltenes from oil involves using propane or butane. The utilization of a lighter paraffin results in the heavier paraffins precipitating along with the asphaltenes thereby diminishing their aromatic character. The oil removed from its asphaltene fraction is known as deasphalted oil or DAO. The precipitated portion is called asphalt. 

Propane deasphalting uses propane as an anti-solvent for asphaltenes. 

Feedstock Paraffinic crude Naphthenic crude Vacuum distillate Vacuum residue Deasphalted atmospheric residue... 

Solvent deasphalting. This is an extraction of the heaviest fractions of a vacuum residue or heavy distillate. The extract is used to produce the bitumen. The separation is based on the precipitation of asphaltenes and the dissolution of the oil in an alkane solvent. The solvents employed are butane or propane or a butane-propane mixture. By selecting the proper feedstock and by controlling the deasphalting parameters, notably temperature and pressure, it is possible to obtain different grades of bitumen by this process. 

The foremost separation process is crude distillation and in second place, if deeper conversion is envisaged, solvent extraction (deasphalting). 

Processing Vacuum Residue by Solvent Extraction (Deasphalting) (Biedermann et al., 1987)... 

Deasphalting is a liquid-liquid separation operation that extracts the last of the easily convertible hydrocarbons from the vacuum residue. Solvents enipl ec) are light paraffins propane, butane, and pentane. The yimd In deasphalted oil increases with the molecular weight of the solvent, but its quality decreases. 5 uxct... 

Asphalt makes up the residue of the deasphalting operation and concentrates the major portion of the impurities such as metals, sediment, 1 salts and asphaltenes. Asphalt fluidity decreases as the molecular weight of... 

Effect of the solvent on the yields and product properties resulting from a deasphalting operation. 

Feedstocks for this very flexible process are usually vacuum distillates, deasphalted oils, residues (hydrotreated or not), as well as by-products from other processes such as extracts, paraffinic slack waxes, distillates from visbreaking and coking, residues from hydrocracking, converted in mixtures with the main feedstock. 

Feedstocks are light vacuum distillates and/or heavy ends from crude distillation or heavy vacuum distillates from other conversion processes visbreaking, coking, hydroconversion of atmospheric and vacuum residues, as well as deasphalted oils. 

Feeds vacuum distillates, deasphalted oil (from C, or process)... 

Intermediate feedstock preparation processes such as direct hydroconversion of vacuum residues, solvent deasphalting, improved coking will also make their appearance. 

The rotating-disk contactor (RDC), developed in the Netherlands (158) in 1951, uses the shearing action of a rapidly rotating disk to interdisperse the phases (Eig. 15b). These contactors have been used widely throughout the world, particularly in the petrochemical industry for furfural [98-01-1] and SO2 extraction, propane deasphalting, sulfolane [126-33-0] extraction for separation of aromatics, and caprolactam (qv) [105-60-2] purification. Columns up to 4.27 m in diameter are in service. An extensive study (159) has provided an excellent theoretical framework for scale-up. A design manual has also been compiled (160). Detailed descriptions and design criteria for the RDC may also be found (161). 

Lubricants. Petroleum lubricants continue to be the mainstay for automotive, industrial, and process lubricants. Synthetic oils are used extensively in industry and for jet engines they, of course, are made from hydrocarbons. Since the viscosity index (a measure of the viscosity behavior of a lubricant with change in temperature) of lube oil fractions from different cmdes may vary from +140 to as low as —300, additional refining steps are needed. To improve the viscosity index (VI), lube oil fractions are subjected to solvent extraction, solvent dewaxing, solvent deasphalting, and hydrogenation. Furthermore, automotive lube oils typically contain about 12—14% additives. These additives maybe oxidation inhibitors to prevent formation of gum and varnish, corrosion inhibitors, or detergent dispersants, and viscosity index improvers. The United States consumption of lubricants is shown in Table 7. 

Production of maleic anhydride by oxidation of / -butane represents one of butane s largest markets. Butane and LPG are also used as feedstocks for ethylene production by thermal cracking. A relatively new use for butane of growing importance is isomerization to isobutane, followed by dehydrogenation to isobutylene for use in MTBE synthesis. Smaller chemical uses include production of acetic acid and by-products. Methyl ethyl ketone (MEK) is the principal by-product, though small amounts of formic, propionic, and butyric acid are also produced. / -Butane is also used as a solvent in Hquid—Hquid extraction of heavy oils in a deasphalting process. 

When the recycle soot in the feedstock is too viscous to be pumped at temperatures below 93°C, the water—carbon slurry is first contacted with naphtha carbon—naphtha agglomerates are removed from the water slurry and mixed with additional naphtha. The resultant carbon—naphtha mixture is combined with the hot gasification feedstock which may be as viscous as deasphalter pitch. The feedstock carbon—naphtha mixture is heated and flashed, and then fed to a naphtha stripper where naphtha is recovered for recycle to the carbon—water separation step. The carbon remains dispersed in the hot feedstock leaving the bottom of the naphtha stripper column and is recycled to the gasification reactor. 

The early developments of solvent processing were concerned with the lubricating oil end of the cmde. Solvent extraction processes are appHed to many usefiil separations in the purification of gasoline, kerosene, diesel fuel, and other oils. In addition, solvent extraction can replace fractionation in many separation processes in the refinery. For example, propane deasphalting (Fig. 7) has replaced, to some extent, vacuum distillation as a means of removing asphalt from reduced cmde oils. 

Liquefied petroleum gases precipitate asphaltic and resinous materials from cmde residues while the lubricating oil constituents remain in solution. Although all Hquefied gases possess this property to some extent, propane and butane are used to deasphalt residual lubricating oils because of their relative low cost and their ease of separation from lubricating oils. 

Asphalt. This is a distillatioa residuum that can also be produced by propane deasphalting (Fig. 7) (33) and thereafter modified to meet specifications. For example, asphalt (qv) can be made softer by blending hard asphalt with the extract obtained ia the solveat treatmeat of lubricatiag oils. Oa the other hand, soft asphalts can be converted iato harder asphalts by oxidation (air blowiag). 

Propane Asphalt. As noted above, cmde oils contain different quantities of residuum (Fig. 2) and, hence, asphalt. Asphalt is also a product of the propane deasphalting and fractionation process (5,6,21,22) which involves the precipitation of asphalt from a residuum stock by treatment with propane under controlled conditions. The petroleum charge stock is usually atmospheric-reduced residue from a primary distillation tower. 

Propane is usually used in this process although propane—butane mixtures and pentane have been used with some variation in process conditions and hardness of the product. Propane deasphalting is used primarily for cmde oils of relatively low asphalt content, generally <15%. Asphalt produced from this process is normally blended with other asphaltic residua for making paving asphalt. 

The process (Fig. 3) is a countercurrent Hquid-Hquid extraction. The feedstock is introduced near the top of an extraction tower and the Hquid propane near the bottom, using solvent-to-oil ratios from 4 1 to 10 1. The deasphalted oil—propane solution is withdrawn overhead and the asphalt from the bottom, and each is subsequently stripped of propane. 

Fig. 3. Schematic representation of propane deasphalting and fractionation process.

Temperature, solvent ratio, and pressure each have an effect upon the spHt point or yield of the oil and asphalt components (Table 3). Contrary to straight reduction which is a high temperature and low pressure process, propane deasphalting is a low temperature and high pressure process. 

Table 3. Typical Yields and Characteristics of Products Obtained from the Propane Deasphalting Process...

Fig. 4. Comparison of propane deasphalting -with vacuum distillation of asphalt from Lagunillas, Venezuela cmde.

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