Dispersion of hydrocarbons

The reactor-outlet stream contains a dispersion of hydrocarbons in sulfuric acid. The first separation step is therefore a liquid-liquid split The sulfuric-acid phase contains some amounts of sec-butyl acid sulfate, which decomposes at higher temperature (15 °C) to produce conjuct polymers dissolved in the acid and a mixture of C4-C1( isoparaffins with low octane number (pseudoalkylate) that separates as a second liquid phase. The hydrocarbon phase contains a small amount of di-isoalkyl sulfates. These need to be removed before entering the distillation units otherwise they will decompose and release sulfuric acid. The sulfates are removed by washing with either dilute caustic or sulfuric acid. In the first case, sulfates are converted to salts that are discarded. With sulfuric acid, sulfates are converted to isoalkyl acid sulfates that can be recycled to the alkylation reactor [15, 10]. 

ASTM D 1218-96. Standard test method for refractive index and refractive dispersion of hydrocarbon liquids. 

ASTM D1218 Test Method for Refractive Index and Refi active Dispersion of Hydrocarbon Liquids... 

ASTM Test Method D1218, Refractive Index and Refractive Dispersion of Hydrocarbon Liquids, is designed to use the Bausch Lomb Precision Refractometer. This model is no longer manufactured. ASTM Test Method D1747, Refractive Index of Viscous Materials, uses the Abbe t3T>e (Valentine) refractometer, which is no longer made. In both cases, other refractometers are available, but no cooperative work has been conducted to verify equivalence. There are also limitations on the availability of thermometers with suitable range and accuracy that will fit the instruments. ASTM Subcommittee D02.04.0D plans cooperative testing of modem commercial refractometers to develop precision data, but data are not yet available. 

Laminae of clay and clay drapes act as vertical or horizontal baffles or barriers to fluid flow and pressure communication. Dispersed days occupy pore space-which in a clean sand would be available for hydrocarbons. They may also obstruct pore throats, thus impeding fluid flow. Reservoir evaluation, is often complicated by the presence of clays. This is particularly true for the estimation of hydrocarbon saturation. 

A thin film of hydrocarbon spread on a horizontal surface of quartz will experience a negative dispersion interaction. Treating these as 1 = quartz, 2 = n-decane, 3 = vacuum, determine the Hamaker constant A123 for the interaction. Balance the negative dispersion force (nonretarded) against the gravitational force to find the equilibrium film thickness. 

Another important class of materials which can be successfiilly described by mesoscopic and contimiiim models are amphiphilic systems. Amphiphilic molecules consist of two distinct entities that like different enviromnents. Lipid molecules, for instance, comprise a polar head that likes an aqueous enviromnent and one or two hydrocarbon tails that are strongly hydrophobic. Since the two entities are chemically joined together they cannot separate into macroscopically large phases. If these amphiphiles are added to a binary mixture (say, water and oil) they greatly promote the dispersion of one component into the other. At low amphiphile... 

The WAG process has been used extensively in the field, particularly in supercritical CO2 injection, with considerable success (22,157,158). However, a method to further reduce the viscosity of injected gas or supercritical fluid is desired. One means of increasing the viscosity of CO2 is through the use of supercritical C02-soluble polymers and other additives (159). The use of surfactants to form low mobihty foams or supercritical CO2 dispersions within the formation has received more attention (160—162). Foam has also been used to reduce mobihty of hydrocarbon gases and nitrogen. The behavior of foam in porous media has been the subject of extensive study (4). X-ray computerized tomographic analysis of core floods indicate that addition of 500 ppm of an alcohol ethoxyglycerylsulfonate increased volumetric sweep efficiency substantially over that obtained in a WAG process (156). 

Hydrogen and sodium do not react at room temperature, but at 200—350°C sodium hydride is formed (24,25). The reaction with bulk sodium is slow because of the limited surface available for reaction, but dispersions in hydrocarbons and high surface sodium react more rapidly (7). For the latter, reaction is further accelerated by surface-active agents such as sodium anthracene-9-carboxylate and sodium phenanthrene-9-carboxylate (26—28). 

Naphthalene sodium prepared in dimethyl ether or another appropriate solvent, or metallic sodium dissolved in Hquid ammonia or dimethyl sulfoxide, is used to treat polyfluorocarbon and other resins to promote adhesion (138—140). Sodium, usually in dispersed form, is used to desulfurize a variety of hydrocarbon stocks (141). The process is most useful for removal of small amounts of sulfur remaining after hydrodesulfurization. 

These are molecules which contain both hydrophilic and hydrophobic units (usually one or several hydrocarbon chains), such that they love and hate water at the same time. Familiar examples are lipids and alcohols. The effect of amphiphiles on interfaces between water and nonpolar phases can be quite dramatic. For example, tiny additions of good amphiphiles reduce the interfacial tension by several orders of magnitude. Amphiphiles are thus very efficient in promoting the dispersion of organic fluids in water and vice versa. Added in larger amounts, they associate into a variety of structures, filhng the material with internal interfaces which shield the oil molecules—or in the absence of oil the hydrophobic parts of the amphiphiles—from the water [3]. Some of the possible structures are depicted in Fig. 1. A very rich phase... 

Data on dispersion and combustion of aerosol-air clouds are scarce, although Burgoyne (1963) showed that the lower flannmability limits on a weight basis of hydrocarbon aerosol-air mixtures are in the same range as those of gas- or vapor-air mixtures, namely, about 50 g/m. ... 

Most nonpolar substances have very small water solubilities. Petroleum, a mixture of hydrocarbons, spreads out in a thin film on the surface of a body of water rather than dissolving. The mole fraction of pentane, CsH12, in a saturated water solution is only 0.0001. These low solubilities are readily understood in terms of the structure of liquid water, which you will recall (Chapter 9) is strongly hydrogen-bonded. Dissimilar intermolecular forces between C5H12 (dispersion) and H2O (H bonds) lead to low solubility. 

A microemulsion (p.E) is a thermodynamically stable, transparent (in the visible) droplet type dispersion of water (W) and oil (O a saturated or unsaturated hydrocarbon) stabilized by a surfactant (S) and a cosurfactant (CoS a short amphiphile compound such as an alcohol or an amine) [67]. Sometimes the oil is a water-insoluble organic compound which is also a reactant and the water may contain mineral acids or salts. Because of the small dispersion size, a large amount of surfactant is required to stabilize microemulsions. The droplets are very small (about 100-1000 A [68]), about 100 times smaller than those of a typical emulsion. The existence of giant microemulsions (dispersion size about 6000 A) has been demonstrated [58]. 

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