The use of coke as a fuel is problematic due to its heavy metal content (e.g. nickel, cadmium and vanadium) or other elements such as sulfur, requiring complex purification. This requires efficient coke and sulfur handling systems for refineries.
Efficient sulfur recovery is an indispensable part of modern oil refining, allowing companies to meet stringent environmental requirements and generate a huge amount of valuable by-product for additional income.
Separation of impurities along with the production of valuable by-products such as petroleum coke and sulfur are an integral part of any refinery project.
Coke and sulfur handling systems at refineries helps companies minimize environmental risks, as well as increase refinery efficiency and reduce operating costs.
All of the above requires companies to implement costly, sophisticated coke and sulfur handling systems to produce valuable hydrocarbon products and meet increasingly stringent environmental standards.
Viola Funding Limited is ready to offer long-term financing for your business ideas, whether it is the construction of a new refinery or the modernization of existing equipment.
Environmental aspects of oil refining
Modern standards require refineries to achieve a high level of waste management, including as part of an overall Environment, Health and Safety (EHS) management system.
Once refinery waste management standards have been established, additional standards, procedures, equipment and suppliers need to be defined to build a system for handling sulfur, coke and other by-products that meets the company’s goals.
Processing of refinery waste is carried out in order to reduce their mass or volume, improve their properties, ensure their safe processing or disposal, and possibly reduce the costs of these activities.
In refineries, these systems must ensure that employees responsible for waste management activities are well trained to perform their tasks in a safe and environmentally sound manner. All procedures for handling petroleum coke, sulfur and other wastes should be documented and updated periodically. Indicators need to be implemented and monitored to ensure that the system is functioning properly and to help identify opportunities for improvement.
Processing of refinery waste is carried out in order to reduce their mass or volume, improve their properties, ensure their safe processing or disposal, and possibly reduce the costs of these activities.
Sludges are defined as semi-liquid residues resulting from refining process and wastewater treatment. Oil sludge is a hazardous material that can be described as a stable oil-in-water emulsion containing solids and metals. It undergoes further high-tech processing aimed at reducing the environmental hazard of the waste and extracting valuable by-products.
Modern coke and sulfur handling systems in refineries
Highly efficient sulfur recovery units (SRUs) are the main solution to this problem today. Recent advances in the Clauss process to recover elemental sulfur from hydrogen sulfide now remove up to 99.8% of sulfur from oil, eliminating the need for additional costly units.
The growing demand for the processing of high-sulphur crude oil requires refineries to address a range of engineering challenges.
Engineering companies offer ingenious ways to increase the efficiency of the Claus process, such as supplying additional oxygen in the air line to the reaction furnace. Oxygen can also be introduced directly into the furnace through a lance or burner, or air can be supplied instead of oxygen through the furnace burner. In some cases, replacing the supply air with oxygen can double the capacity of the Claus plant, while allowing more ammonia to be destroyed by increasing the temperature.
Innovative coke and sulfur handling systems for refineries provide significant improvements in process flexibility by offering low cost, high performance and energy saving solutions.
The introduction of such systems in refineries requires a lot of experience, as engineering companies must simultaneously provide a customized approach to the design of pipelines and infrastructure, implement reliable security measures and conduct personnel training.
Financing the construction of refinery coke and sulfur handling systems requires million dollar investment in the early stages of a project.
Viola Funding Limited is ready to assist in financing your oil refining project on a long-term basis.
We offer flexible solutions for every client, including investment loans, project finance instruments, loan guarantees, financial modeling services and more.
Together with our high-net-worth angel investor’s, we can offer advanced engineering solutions for all aspects of oil and gas production and processing, including the construction of a refinery under an EPC contract.
Contact us to find out more.
Production of petroleum coke and coke handling systems
The starting material for the production of petroleum coke are very heavy oils, which accumulate as a residue during vacuum distillation. The bitumen is converted in the coker unit. Delayed coking is now considered a common process. During cracking, in addition to volatile hydrocarbons (gases and gasoline) that are released, coke is formed in solid form.
Petroleum coke, being one of the by-products of oil refining, is used primarily as a fuel, but can also be used in industrial purposes.
Coke can be both a main product and a by-product, depending on the nature of the initial hydrocarbons, the chosen technology and process conditions.
The raw form is called green coke and can be further processed by calcining at high temperatures (about 1200 °C). In this case, all associated oil components are burned, and the solid residue consists of almost pure carbon.
Refineries produce a number of different types of sludge from crude oil and petroleum products tanks, oil separators and flotation units. The purpose of sludge treatment by dewatering, drying or incineration is to reduce the volume and residual hydrocarbon content in order to save on further processing and reduce costs.
Dehydrated biological and oil sludges can be treated by drying or incineration, which in practice leads to oil-free residues that can be used for various purposes.
Dehydration of oil product sludge is used only at refineries that dispose of the obtained cake outside the site. Disposal can occur in cement plant kilns, coal-fired power plants, specialized waste incinerators, and municipal and hazardous waste incinerators.
Given the wide range of technologies for petroleum coke and sulfur handling systems, our team prefers to develop specific solutions together with the customer.
Together we will find the optimal solution.
Contact Viola funding for access to cutting-edge technology and flexible long-term financing.
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