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Method for processing oil sand bitumen

a technology of oil sand bitumen and processing method, which is applied in the petroleum industry, liquid hydrocarbon mixture production, and treatment with plural serial stages only, etc., can solve the problems of unreasonable price reduction of diluting agent at a price lower than its original cost, economic unreasonable, and huge working capital, etc., to achieve low equipment cost, reduce the viscosity of bitumen products, and reduce the effect of viscosity

Inactive Publication Date: 2007-06-07
CHINA NAT OFFSHORE OIL CORP
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  • Summary
  • Abstract
  • Description
  • Claims
  • Application Information

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Benefits of technology

[0014] An object of the present invention is to overcome the above disadvantages existing in the prior arts, i.e. high costs in pipeline transmission and processing of the oil sand bitumen, and to provide a low-cost method for processing and pipeline transmitting oil sand bitumen.
[0015] Another object of the present invention is to provide on the above-mentioned basis a method for processing the oil sand bitumen with better overall economic benefits.
[0018] The method for processing oil sand bitumen provided by this invention can by means of visbreaking and solvent deasphalting reduce the viscosity of bitumen products and effectively solve the problem concerning the pipeline transmission of the oil sand bitumen. The method provided by this invention is simple in operation, low in equipment cost and drastically low in operating cost, and not only can solve the problem concerning high investment required by purchasing massive diluting agent for the traditional oil sand bitumen processing unit, but also can remarkably reduce the high investment and processing cost required by the upgrading means mainly composed of the coking and hydrogenation processes. On the other hand, this invention can also by means of steam-electricity cogeneration technology convert the DOA mainly comprising heavy asphaltenes and resins into heat energy and electricity to provide a significant amount of steam and power to save massive natural gas necessary for steam generation at the oilfield, which is especially of great significance for the oilfield adopting the steam-aided gravitational drive (SAGD) technology. In the meantime, it is possible to reclaim a large amount of sulfur in the sulfur recovery unit (SRU), which is advantageous in solving the emission problem in compliance with environmental regulations.

Problems solved by technology

Since it is economically unreasonable to sell the diluting agent at a price lower than its original cost, the Oil Sand Bitumen Company generally uses the diluting agent provided by the Pipeline Company as the carrier.
Use of a significant amount of high-value diluting agent would require enormous working capital and is economically unreasonable.
However, it is difficult to effectively develop the oil sand bitumen market because of impediments for finding the right users that can meet the above-mentioned conditions.
The high-sulfur petroleum coke, a by-product obtained by said processing process, is sold at a much lower price and the distribution thereof is difficult owing to lack of buyers.
It is well known that adoption of the technology for hydroprocessing the tower bottom heavy oil to reduce the sulfur content in petroleum coke needs high operating cost and is not beneficial for the investors.

Method used

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  • Method for processing oil sand bitumen
  • Method for processing oil sand bitumen
  • Method for processing oil sand bitumen

Examples

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example 1

[0037] According to the process shown in FIG. 1, the oil sand bitumen is routed to the distillation unit to directly separate the components boiling below 200° C. as the components capable of being transmitted in pipeline from the oil sand bitumen, with the remaining high-boiling point distillation residue entering the visbreaking unit to be subjected to visbreaking at a temperature of 400° C., a pressure of 0.5 MPa and a residence time of 2 hours. The visbreaking products are routed to the light ends separation unit, where the visbreaking products are separated into the components boiling below 500° C. as the components capable of being transmitted in pipeline and the remaining high-boiling point heavy components used as the feedstock of the solvent deasphalting. Said heavy components is carried out the contact extraction with n-butane solvent in the solvent deasphalting unit under the following conditions: a tower bottom temperature of 140° C., a tower overhead temperature of 160°...

example 2

[0038] According to the process shown in FIG. 2, the oil sand bitumen is routed to the atmospheric distillation unit to directly separates the tower overhead components boiling below 200° C. as the components capable of being transmitted in pipeline from the oil sand bitumen, with the AR from the tower bottom being routed to the vacuum distillation unit and being separated into the tower overhead oil boiling between 200-500° C. and the vacuum residuum (VR) boiling above 500° C. Said VR is subjected to contact extraction with the pentane mixed solvent in the solvent extraction unit under the following conditions: a tower bottom temperature of 150° C., a tower overhead temperature of 170° C., a pressure of 5 MPa, and a solvent ratio of 4:1. After the step of solvent deasphalting, a DAO comprising a large amount of solvent and a DOA comprising little or a little of solvent are obtained. The DAO is separated from the tower overhead and is combined after solvent recovery with said vacuum...

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Abstract

This invention relates to a method for processing oil sand bitumen including solvent deasphalting and visbreaking oil sand bitumen to yield de-oiled asphalt (DOA) and components capable of being transmitted in pipeline. The method for processing oil sand bitumen provided by this invention can effectively transmit oil sand bitumen in pipeline with the advantages of simple operation low equipment cost and significantly reduced operating cost. This method not only can solve the problems arising from enormous working capital required for purchasing diluting agent needed by the traditional unit for processing oil sand bitumen and complications in looking for users, but also can drastically reduce the high investment and high processing cost of such main upgrading avenues as coking and converting heavy oils to light distillates. This invention can enhance the effective products yield and increase the sales income. This method for processing oil sand bitumen can make the recovery of sulfur contained therein by means of the downstream processes easier to significantly reduce the sulfur recovery cost and ensure compliance with the pollutants emission standard.

Description

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS [0001] The present patent application claims priority from Chinese Patent Application No. 200510127799.1, filed on Dec. 7, 2005. FIELD OF THE INVENTION [0002] This invention relates to a method for processing oil sand bitumen, in particular to a method for processing oil sand bitumen to enhance the pipeline transmission performance thereof. BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION [0003] Oil sand bitumen is actually a highly viscous asphalt, characterized in a high density (0.97-1.015 g / cm3 at normal temperature and under normal pressure), a high viscosity (generally 100000-1000000 cSt at room temperature), and high contents of sulfur, asphaltenes and nickel and vanadium. The oil sand bitumen averagely comprises 83.2% carbon element and 10.4% hydrogen element with a very high C / H ratio and a high viscosity and almost cannot flow at ambient temperature. [0004] Currently the oil sand bitumen is mined mainly by the following three processes: [0005] 1. Cyclic ...

Claims

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Application Information

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Patent Type & Authority Applications(United States)
IPC IPC(8): C10G1/04
CPCC10G1/002C10G55/04
Inventor ZHENG, CHANGBOZHANG, YUZHENHE, ZHONGWENLIU, QIANGHUANG, HUIZE
Owner CHINA NAT OFFSHORE OIL CORP
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