Petroleum refinery modeling

The purpose of this case study is to illustrate how to develop such models. Since the FCC process is the most important and widely used process in a petroleum refinery, the present work is concerned with predicting yields and properties for this process. 

An LP model for a petroleum refinery would consist of a number of modules for the different units (e.g., FCC, hydrocracker, fluid delayed coker, etc.). Each of these... 

The remainder of Chapter 5 is organized as follows. In Section 5.2, we explain the problem statement of the petroleum refinery and petrochemical integration. Then, we discuss the proposed model formulation in Section 5.3. In Section 5.4, we illustrate the performance of the model through an industrial-scale case study. The chapter ends with some concluding remarks in Section 5.5. 

Well over 50 large-scale EO model-based RTO applications have been deployed for petroleum refining processes. These model applications have been deployed in petroleum refineries Liporace et al., 2009 Camolesi et al., 2008 Mudt et al., 1995, both on separation units (crude atmospheric and vacuum distillation units) and on reactor units (including fluidized catalytic crackers (FCC), gasoline reformers, and hydrocrackers). 

The use of linear programming to optimize the flow of process streams through a petroleum refinery began in the mid-1950 s (Symonds, 1955 Manne, 1956). Now, almost twenty-five years later, it is safe to say that one half of U.S. refining capacity is represented by linear programming or LP models which are routinely optimized to schedule operations, evaluate feedstocks, and study new process configurations. 

Bifunctional zeolite catalysts such as platinum loaded acid zeolite catalysts are applied in several petroleum refinery operations, designated as hydroconversion processes isomerisation of light n htha, iso-dewaxing and hydrocracking of heavy fractions [4]. Most experimental investigations in academic laboratories are typically performed with pure model components or simple mixtures thereof as feedstock, and using reaction conditions under which the hydrocarbon compounds are in the vapor phase. Industrial hydroconversion processes are mostly run under three phase, or even in some cases under liquid phase conditions and with feedstocks that are extremely complex mixtures of large numbers of different hydrocarbon compounds [4]. 

Such solvents might be paint thinners, called Varnish Makers and Painters (V.M. P.) naphthas or mineral spirits. There are many other specialty solvent fractions manufactured in petroleum refineries. The product specifications for these solvents as well as for many refinery products are often given in terms of the simple ASTM distillation boiling ranges. However, for best results in modeling, precision distillation analysis is used, with end-product correlation to compare with specifications. Such an approach is often used also for fuel fractions, even to the extent of controlling the operation with gas chromatographic precision distillation analysis. 

The basic data used in modeling petroleum refinery distillations are usually obtained from proprietary systems of which many are marketed. For straight-run... 

Petroleum refinery distillation is like most chemical-plant distillation practice except for two differences Firstly, the number of chemical species present is huge. Computer modeling of refinery distillation is often done by grouping components by boiling point to reduce the complexity of the calculation. 

Luyben Process Modeling, Simulation, and Control for Chemical Engineers McCabe, Smith, J. C., and]Harriott Unit Operations of Chemical Engineering Mickley, Sherwood, and Reed Applied Mathematics in Chemical Engineering Nelson Petroleum Refinery Engineering... 

---