Petroleum Refining and Petrochemicals

General Objectives:

To develop a very comprehensive competency in the fields of petroleum refining and petrochemicals, in terms of processes, equipment, operation, safety, economics...

Specific Objectives:

At the end of training the trainees will be able to:

• Acquire a basic and solid knowledge of refining techniques;
• Select and design main equipment of processing plants;
• Learn about the technology and operation of equipment;
• Understand the main refining processes with their fundamental aspects and their operation;
• Grasp safety and environmental issues in refinery operations;
• Touch upon some economic issues of the industry.

CONTEÚDOS

CONTENTS

Module I – Physico-chemical properties of hydrocarbons and petroleum cuts

• Organic compounds, crude oil and petroleum products;
• Quality control – Standard tests – Blending rules.

Module II – Applied thermodynamics

• Properties of pure substances;
• Fluid properties: liquid-vapor equilibrium of hydrocarbons mixtures, of non ideal mixtures, of non identified components;
• K values from modern numerical methods.

Module III – Distillation course and project with PROII

• Classical industrial column design, short cut methods;
• Operating parameters, optimization, process control parameters;
• Internal equipment;
• Practice of PROII/PROVISION, process simulation, simplified design of equipment, economic evaluation and optimization.

Module IV – Crude oil and vacuum distillation

• Typical distillation units: process diagrams, operating conditions, separation quality;
• Corrosion and desalting;
• Operating and control of multidraw-off columns; vacuum systems.

Module V – Processing of light cuts and middle distillates

• Catalytic reforming, isomerization, hydrotreatment, sweetening of light cuts and sulfur recovery.

Module VI – Processing of heavy cuts

• Overview of conversion processes: thermal processes, catalytic processes;
• Visbreaking, coking processes, FCC, RFCC, distillate hydrocracking, residue hydrocracking.

Module VII – Heat transfer equipment

• Heat transmission;
• Heat exchangers: sizing and performances, operation;
• Furnaces and boilers: performances, operating conditions, combustion, operation, safety.

Module VIII – Fluid flow – Rotating machinery

• Characteristics of liquid and gas simple phase flow; gas compression laws, expansion;
• Technology and operation of pumps, compressors, steam turbines, gas turbines, electrical motors.

Module IX – Instrumentation and process control

• Instrumentation, controllers, valves, control loops implementation;
• PID tuning, monovariable control limits, multivariable control.

Module X – Safety in Operations

• Product and equipment related risks, safety in process operation;
• Hazard analysis in design and operation.

Module XI – Production of olefins and aromatics

• Sources, outlets and main industrial uses of olefinic and aromatic intermediaries;
• Steam cracking and treatment of the cuts produced;
• Fluid catalytic cracking (FCC) and production of aromatics;
• Economics of petrochemicals.