Alkanes petroleum

The two main natural sources of alkanes are natural gas and petroleum. Alkanes are insoluble in and less dense than water. Their boiling points increase with molecular weight and, for isomers, decrease with chain branching. 

Isomerization (rearrangement) of hydrocarbons is of substantial practical importance. Straight-chain alkanes obtained from petroleum... 

Phytane is a naturally occurring alkane produced by the alga Spirogyra and is a constituent of petroleum The lUPAC name for phytane is 2 6 10 14 tetramethylhexadecane Write a structural formula for phytane... 

Hydrocarbons, compounds of carbon and hydrogen, are stmcturally classified as aromatic and aliphatic the latter includes alkanes (paraffins), alkenes (olefins), alkynes (acetylenes), and cycloparaffins. An example of a low molecular weight paraffin is methane [74-82-8], of an olefin, ethylene [74-85-1], of a cycloparaffin, cyclopentane [287-92-3], and of an aromatic, benzene [71-43-2]. Cmde petroleum oils [8002-05-9], which span a range of molecular weights of these compounds, excluding the very reactive olefins, have been classified according to their content as paraffinic, cycloparaffinic (naphthenic), or aromatic. The hydrocarbon class of terpenes is not discussed here. Terpenes, such as turpentine [8006-64-2] are found widely distributed in plants, and consist of repeating isoprene [78-79-5] units (see Isoprene Terpenoids). 

The butane-containing streams in petroleum refineries come from a variety of different process units consequently, varying amounts of butanes in mixtures containing other light alkanes and alkenes are obtained. The most common recovery techniques for these streams are lean oil absorption and fractionation. A typical scheme involves feeding the light hydrocarbon stream to an absorber-stripper where methane is separated from the other hydrocarbons. The heavier fraction is then debutanized, depropanized, and de-ethanized by distillation to produce C, C, and C2 streams, respectively. Most often the stream contains butylenes and other unsaturates which must be removed by additional separation techniques if pure butanes are desired. 

Within the VGO saturates, distribution of paraffins, isoparaffins, and naphthenes is highly dependent on the petroleum source. The naphthenes account for roughly 60% of the saturates in a normal cmde oil. However, samples can be found having paraffins from <20 to >80%. In most samples, the / -paraffins from C2Q—are still present in sufficient quantity to be detected as distinct peaks in gc analyses. Some cmde oils show a nearly symmetric pattern of peaks such that each carbon number is present in regular progression up to a maximum around C -j. Other cmde oils show a similar distribution, but have preference for odd-numbered alkanes. Both the distribution and the selectivity toward odd-numbered hydrocarbons are considered to reflect differences in petrogenesis of the cmde oils. Although / -paraffins are distinct in the gc, these usually account for only a few percent of the saturates measured by gc. 

Raw Material and Energy Aspects to Pyridine Manufacture. The majority of pyridine and pyridine derivatives are based on raw materials like aldehydes or ketones. These are petroleum-derived starting materials and their manufacture entails cracking and distillation of alkanes and alkenes, and oxidation of alkanes, alkenes, or alcohols. Ammonia is usually the source of the nitrogen atom in pyridine compounds. Gas-phase synthesis of pyridines requires high temperatures (350—550°C) and is therefore somewhat energy intensive. 

Extraction Solvent. Dimethyl sulfoxide is immiscible with alkanes but is a good solvent for most unsaturated and polar compounds. Thus, it can be used to separate olefins from paraffins (93). It is used in the Institute Fransais du Pntrole (IFF) process for extracting aromatic hydrocarbons from refinery streams (94). It is also used in the analytical procedure for determining polynuclear hydrocarbons in food additives (qv) of petroleum origin (95). 

A paraffin wax is a petroleum wax consisting principally of normal alkanes. MicrocrystalHne wax is a petroleum wax containing substantial proportions of branched and cycHc saturated hydrocarbons, in addition to normal alkanes. SernimicrocrystaUine wax contains more branched and cycHc compounds than paraffin wax, but less than microcrystalHne. A classification system based on the refractive index of the wax and its congealing point as... 

Paraffin wax is macrocrystalline, britde, and is composed of 40—90 wt % normal alkanes, with the remainder C g—isoalkanes and cycloalkanes. Paraffin wax has Httle affinity for oil content fully refined paraffin has less than 1 wt % cmde scale, 1—2 wt %, and slack [64742-61-6] above 2 wt %. Within these classes, the melting point of the wax determines the actual grade, with a range of about 46—71°C. Typical properties of petroleum waxes are listed in Table 3. 

The principal sources of feedstocks in the United States are the decant oils from petroleum refining operations. These are clarified heavy distillates from the catalytic cracking of gas oils. About 95% of U.S. feedstock use is decant oil. Another source of feedstock is ethylene process tars obtained as the heavy byproducts from the production of ethylene by steam cracking of alkanes, naphthas, and gas oils. There is a wide use of these feedstocks in European production. European and Asian operations also use significant quantities of coal tars, creosote oils, and anthracene oils, the distillates from the high temperature coking of coal. European feedstock sources are 50% decant oils and 50% ethylene tars and creosote oils. 

This will generally be tr-ue as we proceed to look at other alkanes as the number of carbon atoms increases, so does the boiling point. All the alkanes with four car bons or less are gases at room temperature and atmospheric pressure. With the highest boiling point of the three, propane is the easiest one to liquefy. We are all faniliar- with propane tanks. These are steel containers in which a propane-rich mixture of hydrocar bons called liquefied petroleum gas (LEG) is maintained in a liquid state under high pressure as a convenient clean-burning fuel. 

Natural gas is an abundant source of methane, ethane, and propane. Petroleum is a liquid mixture of many hydrocarbons, including alkanes. Alkanes also occur naturally in the waxy coating of leaves and fruits. 

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