Process for converting crude oil containing sulfur and metals and process for producing fuel components

Abstract

The invention relates to a process for converting crude oil containing sulfur and metals and a process for producing fuel components. The present invention provides a process for converting crude oil containing sulfur and metals, comprising: (a) separating the crude oil into the following fractions by one or more distillation steps: (a) (1) a liquid fraction at or below the sulfur breakpoint; (a) (2) a liquid fraction above the sulfur breakpoint; (b) feeding the residue to a solvent separation step to remove a metal-rich resid; (c) treating the liquid fraction above the sulfur breakpoint by one or more hydrotreating steps, thereby forming one or more hydrotreated streams of reduced sulfur content; and (d) combining the hydrotreated stream with (a) a liquid fraction at or below the sulfur breakpoint (1) to form a fuel.

Description

[0001] This application is a divisional application of the invention patent application with the application date of October 18, 2016, the invention name of which is “Environmentally friendly marine fuel” and the application number is CN201680086760.6 (the international application number is PCT / US2016 / 057540). Technical Field

[0002] The present invention relates to a method and apparatus for producing very low sulfur fuel from crude oil, refinery residues and other contaminated liquid feeds. The very low sulfur fuel produced by the present invention is particularly cost-effective for large marine transport vessels on board and large land-based combustion gas turbines on shore. Background Art

[0003] The present invention addresses a long known and large environmental problem that has not been solved until now, namely, the release of oxides of sulfur, nitrogen and metals into the environment when ships burn cheap low grade heavy fuel oil and other heavy residual oils high in sulfur, nitrogen and metals "on the high seas". Such emissions are worldwide and do not recognize domestic geographic boundaries.

[0004] Various third-party reports indicate that some of the global emissions generated by marine combustion of this heavy fuel for water transport are many times higher than global emissions from short fleets burning gasoline and diesel fleets. This marine combustion produces emissions of Sox, NOx, CO2, smoke, and toxic metals. Shore vehicles include cars, trucks, and other vehicles, many of which now use mandatory "road fuels" with very low sulfur content. Therefore, even if the transportation of such large ships is efficient based on "tons per mile freight" and fuel consumption, the reality is that such ships generate a lot of emissions.

[0005] The implementation of certain key regulations requires ships to use cleaner burning marine fuels, which is dependent on the availability of sufficient quantities of such fuels. This is done in order not to command something that is technically or economically impossible or impractical, but a solution is needed.

[0006] For example, the International Maritime Organization (IMO) is a department of the United Nations that issues regulations for international shipping. IMO has been working to reduce emissions by enacting stricter sulfur limits on marine fuels, while recognizing technological limitations. IMO requires that marine fuel burned on the high seas after 2011 must have a sulfur content of no more than 3.50% m / m (for example, burned outside of defined Emission Control Areas (ECAs) 200 nautical miles off the coast of the United States, Europe, and certain other countries). In 2015, IMO revised its regulations to limit the sulfur content of marine fuels to less than 0.1% for commercial ships within designated ECAs.

[0007] However, the IMO has again significantly reduced the high seas sulphur limit to 0.50% m / m by 2020 and beyond. However, the IMO notes that this aggressive reduction in 2020 is dependent on “the outcome of a review of the availability of the required fuel oil, which will be completed in 2018” and suggests that if the required fuel is not available then this reduction may be postponed to 2025. Regulations on air pollution in the maritime industry are found in Annex VI to the Convention on Marine Pollution (MARPOL).

[0008] Therefore, there is a lack of supply availability of low sulfur marine fuel and a lack of practical possibility of technology to achieve such supply. To illustrate, a 2015 industry publication states that "Plans are in place to reduce the sulfur content allowed in fuels below the

[2014] levels required in emission control areas... but this will take several years as current technology will make it cost-prohibitive for many shipping companies." The publication further states that "these regulations are constantly being re-evaluated due to additional costs and possible mechanical problems, and a phased approach is being used for implementation" because many marine engines are not designed to handle low sulfur gas oil because it is much thinner than heavy fuel oil and it does not have the lubricating properties of heavy fuel oil. Companies are using various workarounds to make it work, such as cooling the fuel to increase viscosity or injecting additional lubricants into certain parts of the engine. Internet article published on Quora titled "Is it true that the 15biggest ships in the world produce more pollution than all the cars?" by Josiah Toepfer, CG Office, Ship Inspector / Auditor, Casualty Investigator.

[0009] Another illustration is that in 2015, IMO regulations reduced the sulfur content of marine fuels for commercial ships within designated ECAs to a maximum sulfur content of 0.1%. Before entering an ECA, ships must switch fuel from sulfur-rich but low-cost high-sulfur heavy fuel oil burned on the high seas to expensive low-sulfur fuels, similar to highway diesel fuel. After January 1, 2010, the reduction of internal ECA fuel sulfur content from 1.00% m / m (after July 1, 2010) to 0.10% m / m created market supply and price challenges. The production and supply of such fuels for maritime use that meet the relevant IMO regulatory requirements competes with the demand for distillate fuels for highway and other onshore diesel applications, and diverts the available preferred feed streams and existing refining units and feed supply networks from the road use of diesel and other low-sulfur distillates. Moreover, other technical issues arise on board ships.

[0010] In relation to the 2015 IMO sulfur reduction within ECAs, the US Coast Guard warns that “ships using higher sulfur fuels must switch to ultra-low sulfur (ULS) fuels to comply” with the new regulations. Vessels must use ULS fuels at entry and exit transit points at the terminal and at all times within an ECA, so each ship using higher sulfur fuels must develop and implement conversion procedures to switch between residual fuels and distillate fuels before entering an ECA. The Coast Guard further warns that “there are many other important technical issues with the use of ULSF and fuel conversion in documents produced by class societies, insurance companies, engine manufacturers and industry associations” and that “the energy content of a given volume of ULS fuel may be different from residual fuels such that existing throttle settings may not give the desired propeller shaft speed or generator load.” Before entering and while operating in an ECA, the US Coast Guard US Department of Homeland Security Bureau of Inspections and Compliance Safety Alert 2-15 March 3, 2015 Washington, DC Ultra-low sulfur fuels comply with MARPOL requirements.

[0011] The stark reality is that refineries are expensive and even relatively minor changes to fuel products or production equipment or the addition of unit operations require significant capital investment. In 2003, a European refinery assessment study was undertaken to meet the need for lower levels of pollutants in marine fuels and the requirements and capacity to produce the necessary quantities of marine fuels. See e.g. Marine fuel proposals, potential price premium for 0.5%S marine fuel; specific issues facing fuel producers across the EU; and Comments on the marine fuel market, Draft Final Report Contract No. ENV.C1 / SER / 2001 / 0063. Order No. C1 / 3 / 2003. European Commission - Directorate-General Environment, October 2003.

[0012] These reports identified a number of challenges, such as high costs or reduced refinery utilization or efficiency in many countries in seeking to produce the necessary quantities of suitable bunker fuels, including, in some cases, a lack of local infrastructure near major ports for local production and supply of such bunker fuels and a lack of technology and equipment to manufacture such fuels.

[0013] The cited report sees only three options. The "re-blending option" (mixing heavy fuel oil with low-sulfur fuel) is seen as the lowest cost option to produce low-sulfur fuel, but this option is not sufficient because it would only process the lowest amount of material without major costs. For re-blending the different categories of heavy fuel oil produced by European refineries at the time, this option has relatively small costs associated with logistics, but the quantities are not qualified.

[0014] The second alternative, by increasing costs, is to process low sulfur crude oil by replacing high sulfur crude oil, such as replacing Arabian Light, which reportedly contains 1.8% sulfur, with a lower sulfur crude oil (e.g., an African crude such as Bonny Light, which reportedly contains 0.14% sulfur by weight). The estimated cost of the increase in marine fuel incurred by this alternative is considered to be too burdensome for the reasons stated in the report.

[0015] Finally, the Old Times report mentions the third most expensive option of producing low sulfur marine grade fuels through vacuum residue desulfurization (VRDS). The report concludes that "It is important to note, however, that, in contrast to the degree of desulfurization required for gasoline or diesel, hydrotreating of the bottom of the barrel (residue desulfurization) is not a process that refineries themselves are currently considering implementing, that is, if it is not coupled with some conversion of the residue into lighter products. Nevertheless, if the sole purpose of pursuing VRDS is the desulfurization of the vacuum residue, the cost of this alternative" is about twice that of the second alternative and is therefore even more unacceptable.

[0016] To meet the IMO requirements for existing technology, ship operators can use fuel oil with a high sulfur content at sea and fuel oil with a low sulfur content in the ECAs; however, this option may face issues with engine technology, lubricity and the possible need for different fuel injection systems to achieve optimal operation and mechanics of the switch fuels. Operators can add post-combustion flue treatment equipment, which can be relatively large, expensive and complex, to maintain the highest performance levels. In some cases, liquefied natural gas (LNG) may be considered for use as a marine fuel, for example, some transport carriers of LNG have the option of using "boil-off gas" as fuel, while extending the LNG engine concept to all cargo ships requires a widely distributed LNG bunkering station infrastructure, which is very expensive, increasing the costs of these ports where there is no local natural gas production supply or liquefaction facilities. However, in all cases, the use of LNG instead of a liquid carrier carries the real risk of such use, releasing methane when gaps occur through ventilation during refueling or incomplete combustion or during operation and maintenance. Such methane releases are of concern because methane is considered by some to have many times more impact as an environmental greenhouse gas than sulfur dioxide. Similarly, some assert that emissions reductions can be achieved in marine applications by flaring natural gas during transport or in port, facilitated by ports with gas supply stations. However, from a technical overview perspective, natural gas retains the methane leak problem, and flaring natural gas reduces CO2 emissions, not because it releases less CO2, but rather the use of natural gas avoids CO2 emissions during the handling of liquefied natural gas compared to LNG, and flaring in ports to supply ships reduces CO2 when oil is withdrawn or coal is replaced. Development activities to promote LNG or natural gas as a substitute for liquids as a marine fuel are useful considerations, but these development activities cannot provide any practical cost-effective marine solutions when there is a lack of global gas infrastructure and new bunkering infrastructure that is equipment- and capital-intensive in ports in countries that do not produce local gas supplies.

[0017] There is a need to address these global environmental issues, which have persisted for many years without cost-effective technical solutions, with approved marine fuels. In addition, the availability of new low-cost fuels made by new process configurations and plants should encourage ship owners to install highly efficient combined cycle propulsion power generation systems, which have higher efficiencies than diesel engines due to the effective use of waste heat recovery and do not have the problem of insufficient fuel lubricity, as is the case with many engines burning more expensive ultra-low sulfur diesel fuels when supplies are limited.

[0018] However, a long-standing gap in efficient fuel production technology has resulted in a shortage of low-cost, bulk very low-sulfur marine fuels. The need to fill this gap remains.

[0019] The International Energy Agency (EIA), Petroleum Industry and Markets publishes official announcements that describe the processes and unit configurations used to produce fuels and describe conventional refinery configurations, products, and profits. Unless otherwise defined or explicitly modified, the terms used in this article shall have the meaning given in "Glossary, Source: US Energy Information Administration (October 2016)", which is incorporated herein for all purposes. EIA publications define and discuss configurations for processing crude oil, dividing each barrel of crude oil feed into multiple products for different applications or downstream processing.

[0020] The genetic basis for the development or growth of conventional refineries is the evolution of society's product needs, from basic kerosene-grade distillates to a variety of products such as motor gasoline and diesel, then aviation-grade fuels, and then many downstream feedstock chemical applications. Refinery technology development appears to have generally evolved in an incremental manner, with the goal of adjusting to maximize a given allocation per barrel of crude oil for a specific market segment, or adapting the refinery to various streams of downstream chemical production while retaining the production of a variety of products for different end-use applications.

[0021] Therefore, prior art refinery designs using atmospheric crude and / or vacuum distillation units, solvent separation, hydrotreating, gasification and many other unit operations separate each barrel of crude oil feed into multiple products, each product having a different application or different specifications for downstream processing.

[0022] In conventional refining, it is inversely straightforward to separate the feed into different unit effluents and then recombine all of these effluents. For illustration, the above EIA references define and describe conventional or typical atmospheric crude distillation, vacuum distillation, fuel solvent deasphalting, catalytic hydroprocessing, and integrated gasification-combined cycle technologies, but no such process is configured to convert substantially all of the crude oil feed to produce only liquid fuels.

[0023] Within the scope of conventional refining processes are "upgrading," "top-up," or "hydro-hardening" facilities. For crude oil upgraders, the primary goal is to convert material that is typically very heavy, highly viscous, or solids-entrained so that it can be reprocessed in existing conventional refineries that process lighter, flowable material to produce a full range of fuel products, chemical feedstocks, and / or petroleum coke. Upgraders simply convert heavier crude oils into lighter density crude oils for feeding conventional refineries that are individually designed to address sulfur to meet their respective downstream product specifications, and sulfur reduction or metal elimination is not the primary goal of the upgrader. The goal is to upgrade source material that has an extremely high density compared to a typical low density crude oil source. The heavier material is discharged or separated from the source material so that the density of the resulting upgraded product material approaches the density of the crude oil that the existing conventional refinery equipment is configured to process. With regard to top-up or "mini" refineries, these refineries are often located in remote or crude oil source opportunity locations. Top tier refineries typically separate each barrel of crude feed into multiple straight run fractions, targeting naphtha, not gasoline production, with no or minimal subsequent processing, except in some limited cases, naphtha reforming for gasoline octane improvement and hydrotreating multiple fractions to produce various products. The typical top tier refinery goal is to produce a variety of directly usable fuel-usable products such as gasoline, kerosene, diesel and fuel oil for local market consumption. In some top tiers and poor practices of using their products or their failure to properly handle the residue, harmful emissions to the environment are increased rather than reduced. For hydrotreating refineries, crude oil is converted into a variety of products similar to top tier refineries, but usually only limited heavy naphtha reformers are added, which also produce hydrogen, which is consumed by the hydrotreater in the production of diesel. Like top tier refineries, hydrocrackers can usually produce a variety of gasoline, kerosene, diesel and fuel oil for local consumption, rather than just one product.

[0024] Various aspects of adapting hydroprocessing, including having separate hydroprocessing reactor zones in series or in parallel or having integrated hydroprocessing reactor zones, are known in the art. PCT / US1999 / 00478 (1998) published by Cash et al. and references cited therein disclose integrated hydroprocessing of different feeds, wherein hydrogen-containing and liquid-containing streams from separate hydroprocessing zones are shared or combined in the manner disclosed therein. Various aspects of extracting deasphalted oil from asphalt in heavy residue streams using solvent separation, and using deasphalted oil as a hydroprocessing feed are known in the art for producing a variety of product streams. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 7,686,941 (2010) to Brierley et al. discusses solvent deasphalting for producing deasphalted oil by separating the feed without cracking or degradation based on solubility in a liquid solvent such as propane or other paraffinic solvents, such as butane, pentane and others including heptane. The remaining asphalt contains high metal and sulfur content. Deasphalted oil can be hydrotreated to remove sulfur, nitrogen, carbon, and metals, as discussed in this reference, to produce several products, including naphtha, kerosene, diesel, and residual materials.

[0025] The global market needs to provide a large supply of fuels that are low in sulfur and nitrogen and essentially free of metal contaminants to address global environmental issues in the open ocean or onshore areas where there are few or no natural gas resources or high sulfur fuel oil or crude oil is used for power generation at low efficiency.

[0026] Fuel producers require designs that are different from those used in conventional refineries to produce multiple products. To keep costs low, the design should be equipped with low capital investment, only the plant must produce large quantities of clean fuel in a cost-effective and thermally efficient manner. The goal of the design should be primarily to produce marine fuel, rather than just extracting a relatively small portion of each barrel of crude oil for marine fuel and not using a larger portion of the barrel for other applications.

[0027] What the world needs is a "game changing" new process that provides a solution to the technical problem of how to make large quantities of relatively clean liquid fuels in an economical manner for marine applications (in an efficient form to avoid wasting energy expressed in short form as British Thermal Units (BTUs). Since existing liquid-based marine fueling stations (for illustration, those that supply high sulfur fuel oil (HSFO)) are located throughout the world, such a process should have minimal required infrastructure and associated capital and operating costs. Such fuels can be used to distribute without having to create new infrastructure for LNG. Any such new process should be oriented to support the production of liquid BTUs cost-effectively compared to ultra-low sulfur diesel (ULSD) which is primarily used for automobile and truck applications. ULSD is not widely used by large marine transport ships at sea for many existing marine diesel engines due to cost and lubricity issues. Summary of the invention

[0028] The present invention fills the gap in efficient fuel production technology, enabling the supply of large quantities of fuel with extremely low sulfur, nitrogen and substantially no metals at low cost, particularly suitable for offshore applications as well as large onshore applications (such as combustion gas turbines) for power generation. As used in the specification and claims, the term "substantially free of metals" or "zero metal" refers to a metal content in the range of 0 to less than 100 ppbwt (parts per billion) or less or as low as a content that is difficult to reliably measure with conventional on-line instruments.

[0029] In conventional refining, the crude feed is cut into many pieces, each of which is sent to a separate market path. In contrast, we have found that we can convert the maximum amount of each barrel of crude feed into a single ultra-clean fuel while capturing the contaminants sulfur, nitrogen and toxic metals, in addition to the crude fractions that provide the processing utility and streams for this conversion and capture. The present invention cuts the crude feed into the minimum number of pieces required for contaminant capture and control, and then reassembles the pieces to form one fuel product.

[0030] Thus, unlike conventional refining, which separates each barrel of crude oil feedstock to address multiple markets, such as gasoline, diesel, fuel oil, or feedstock for downstream chemical production or applications, the present invention's processing produces only one major clean fuel product. The present invention provides a low-cost polishing system for crude oil and residual oils that is needed to produce large commercial quantities of clean fuels to replace high sulfur bunker fuels and other heavy residual oils used in commercial shipping vessels and power plant combustion systems. The present invention provides these fuels, as well as methods and apparatus for producing such fuels, so as to reduce sulfur in a cost-effective manner.

[0031] These novel processes use counter-intuitive steps to reduce production costs while controlling final product sulfur content at or below target sulfur levels in a surprisingly effective manner. The present invention provides a new method for converting the maximum amount of each barrel of crude oil feedstock into a single ultra-clean fuel while capturing the contaminants sulfur, nitrogen and toxic metals during the fuel production process.

[0032] In many variations of the invention, substantially all, in certain variations characterized as 90% or more per barrel of feedstock, is converted to this single fuel, and in such variations only a minimal amount, less than about 10 percent (10%) per barrel of crude oil, is used for conversion and capture of pollutants in processing utilities and streams. The processing of the invention enables adjustment of the percentage of feed allocated to fuel products and the allocation of processing utilities and streams for conversion and capture of pollutants for hydrogen balance, local demand for asphalt, coke and other residual products, total production economics and other operational considerations, such as the local availability of alternative low-cost processing fuels and electricity. In a variation, at least seventy percent (70%) of the volume of each barrel of crude oil feedstock is converted to a liquid fraction that, when subsequently processed or unprocessed but combined, forms essentially one liquid fuel product, rather than a plurality of hydrocarbon products, with a sulfur content not exceeding a target sulfur content, and the remainder of each barrel of crude oil feed is residual oil or other vapor or product.

[0033] Unlike conventional refining in which the crude feed is cut into many pieces and each piece is sent along a separate market path, the present invention cuts the crude feed into the minimum number of pieces required for pollutant capture and control, and then reassembles the pieces to form a very low sulfur and nitrogen fuel product, which is substantially free of metals. The processing and device configuration of the present invention enables low-cost and efficient production of large quantities of low-sulfur fuels required for regulatory compliance in large-scale marine and land-based turbine applications. Compared with alternative conventional crude oil refining, these new fuel arrangements have significantly lower capital and operating costs, thereby producing large quantities of fuels with extremely low sulfur, extremely low nitrogen and substantially free of metals in an extremely cost-effective manner. These novel processes enable the energy supply chain from oil fields to ship engines or land-based power plants to be simplified in a very economical manner.

[0034] For the shipping industry, the novel configuration of the present invention provides the low-cost, low-sulfur marine fuels needed to meet global marine sulfur reduction targets. The novel fuel production method and plant arrangement of the present invention has much lower capital and operating costs than replacing conventional crude oil refining, thereby producing large quantities of marine fuels with very low sulfur and essentially no metals and very low nitrogen content in a very cost-effective manner.

[0035] The fuel of the present invention replaces low-grade heavy fuel oil that is high in sulfur and metals, significantly reducing high seas emissions of SOx, NOx, CO2, soot, and toxic metals. Instead of sulfur and metals entering the environment when burning fuel oil, in the practice of the present invention, sulfur, nitrogen, and metals are captured and removed in an environmentally friendly manner during fuel production. In some embodiments, the present invention provides certain low-sulfur alternative fuels at a cost lower than diesel, but these fuels have sufficient lubricity to avoid excessive wear on ship engines, and compared to other alternatives that do not heat the fuel, these new fuels can use existing refueling infrastructure without having to heat it to make it flowable, thereby reducing the energy consumed to heat tanks on land or on ships.

[0036] In one variation, the fuel of the invention also provides an alternative to burning crude oil or heavy residual oil in large land-based combustion gas turbines deployed by utilities, for example, simple cycle or combined cycle power plants, such as those that produce electricity and desalinated water. Depending on the feed source, when burning contaminated heavy crude oil or refinery residual oil, turbines burning the fuel of the invention have significantly less turbine exhaust emissions of NOx, Sox, CO2, soot, toxic metals and other combustion by-products, and less hot zone corrosion or fouling under ash forming conditions.

[0037] The present invention relates to the focused conversion of complex hydrocarbon feeds into a single fuel product for combustion applications such as marine engines, combustion gas turbines or combustion heaters. In a basic embodiment of the invention, crude oil is at the front and a single ultra-clean product fuel is returned with controlled low sulfur levels and reduced nitrogen and eliminated metals. In variations, the distillation feed can be one or more crude oils, combined with one or more high sulfur fuel oils or other heavier residual oils, with the addition of opaque oil or high sulfur fuel oil or both, as part of the feed stream feed one or more other unit operations such as vacuum distillation, solvent separation, hydroprocessing or gasification.

[0038] In different usages in the art, the term "high sulfur fuel oil" or "HSFO" has been designated by different, often dissimilar, conflicting and confusing means in various technical articles, patents and regulations, some of which have changed over time. As used in the specification and claims, "high sulfur fuel oil" or "HSFO" means any material used as a fuel having a sulfur content exceeding 0.50% m / m (0.5% by weight). As used herein, the terms "heavy oil", "heavy residual oil", "residue oil" or "other heavier oils" include petroleum-derived hydrocarbon materials whose sulfur content exceeds 0.50% m / m (0.5 wt.%). The term "high sulfur" means above the target sulfur content limit or the statutory sulfur content limit (if applicable), whichever is lower.

[0039] In a preferred embodiment, the sulfur content of the final product fuel is controlled by combining streams having different sulfur contents. In a variant, each stream so combined is formed to an intermediate target sulfur content by adjusting unit operating conditions and flow rates, by trimming, adding or removing very low sulfur streams, or by mixing feeds of different sulfur contents. Variants of the present invention include controlling product sulfur content by selecting crude oil with optional feeds of one or more of the following: (i) other crude oils, (ii) marine fuels, (iii) high sulfur fuel oil or other distillates (iv) high sulfur or metal-contaminated residual oils from other sources. As used in the specification and claims, the term "substantially free of metals" or "zero metals" refers to a metal content in the range of 0 to less than 100 ppbwt (parts per billion) or less or as low as a content that is difficult to reliably measure with conventional on-line instruments.

[0040] We have discovered that we can optimize the production of low sulfur fuels by addressing different crude feed sulfur content profiles.

[0041] We can address (i) when only a relatively small fraction of the sulfur is in the basic H2S or RSH mercaptan-type basic form in certain fractions and (ii) when a relatively high proportion of the sulfur is in the form of more complex organic structures, and then adjust process flow rates and operating conditions based on the predicted breakpoint fractions, where the sulfur content begins to increase more rapidly, even exponentially, than at lower fraction levels.

[0042] We have discovered that we can arrange processing and equipment layouts to achieve and maximize bypassing of certain streams and avoid or reduce processing of streams containing substantially less complex sulfur forms and treat streams containing more complex forms differently. This can include selectively removing hydrodesulfurization from certain streams and others, feeding them to different hydrotreaters and adjusting different hydrotreater unit conditions or adjusting removal in solvent and / or reactive chemical based processes by one or more solvents or other removal agents in one or more removal units, wherein the ratio of each removal agent in each unit is adjusted based on the sulfur profile of each unit to selectively remove less or more complex sulfur containing molecules.

[0043] The terms "kerosene" and "light distillates" are often given the same, overlapping or even different meanings in different reference materials, but are uniformly defined based only on atmospheric crude tower temperature interval cut points (such as from 190°C to 250°C or 180°C to 230°C or others), and not based on sulfur content. Instead, a convenient sulfur content measurement and reporting is made according to the cut point temperature intervals, which are determined by the specifications of each product from a conventional refinery. We have found that it is not optimal.

[0044] We have discovered that if we change the fundamental way that crude distillation columns operate, then we can optimize the reduced cost of low sulfur fuel production. We have discovered that we should determine certain distillation cuts based on the sulfur content of the side stream, reflecting the sulfur content of the crude feed or feed mix to the column, rather than the standard product temperature range specifications for downstream historical uses (such as kerosene, jet fuel, diesel, etc.).

[0045] We have discovered how to define a "breakpoint" to address the point at which the change in sulfur content per unit change in production (actually run ramp) is no longer essentially flat, but rather at the breakpoint, as the amount of cut increases slightly, the sulfur content begins to increase rapidly, or exponentially, such as with a high rate of change per unit run. Also at or after the breakpoint, depending on the type of crude feed, there is often a change in the type and composition and complexity of sulfur-containing compounds. The breakpoint is a guide to separating streams or portions of streams that need to be desulfurized from those where desulfurization can be minimized or eliminated.

[0046] We have found that we can minimize the capital and production costs of low-sulfur fuels if we minimize total liquid production with sulfur content at or below the breakpoint, thereby directly cutting and collecting the maximum amount of material with sulfur content at or below the breakpoint and avoiding or reducing the cost of its downstream processing for sulfur reduction or removal.

[0047] We find relatively large quantities of this material at or below the breakpoint, and in some crudes, those portions within a narrow zone above the breakpoint, that when combined with other cuts already made, do not require treatment or subsequent significant sulfur removal treatment to desulfurize. We maximize the production of this untreated material by pushing atmospheric distillation conditions (primarily through feed or tower temperature profile increases), but also by reducing or eliminating reflux or lowering crude feed rates or blending or diluting feed crudes to change the crude hydrocarbon or sulfur composition to maximize the amount of cut to near or at the breakpoint. The breakpoint is not defined according to standard industry classifications or regulatory set temperature ranges.

[0048] For purposes of the specification and claims, with reference to an assay or other assay of crude oil, plotted as the x-axis with the sulfur content as the y-axis, we define a "breakpoint" as the point at which the sulfur content begins to increase rapidly or exponentially with respect to a high rate of change per unit run from level or near level, wherein the increment of the run is the change in unit volume of the fraction, and the increment of the rise is the change in units of sulfur content, and the slope is the rise relative to the run, and such rise relative to the run slope begins near zero or level, moves rapidly past 0.2 to moves rapidly past 1 to a sudden exponential increase in sulfur content, the breakpoint will vary based on the crude oil or other feed to the distillation column. "Breakpoint cut" or "sulfur breakpoint cut," therefore addresses a method of determining the split of hydrocarbon-containing liquids having a boiling point above the end of the naphtha range, such as above the end of the range of unstable wild run naphtha, but below or at the breakpoint, as described above, the sulfur content begins to increase rapidly or exponentially with respect to a high rate of change per unit run.

[0049] For purposes of the specification and claims, we define a substantially "breakpoint cut" or substantially "sulfur breakpoint cut" to mean that the sulfur content of a reference fraction, containing hydrocarbonaceous liquids having a boiling point above the end of the unstable wild straight-chain running naphtha range but below or at the breakpoint, is selected such that when the combination of all unprocessed streams at or below the breakpoint forms a fuel production stream, all streams above the breakpoint cut that are added to such combination are selected, the actual sulfur content of the combined fuel does not exceed a target sulfur content. In variations, fuels may be produced according to a combination of streams wherein the target sulfur content is the sulfur breakpoint, or is above or below the sulfur breakpoint, and the reference breakpoint effectively forms a fuel such that the actual sulfur content of the fuel does not exceed the sulfur target.

[0050] For many crude oils, the sulfur breakpoint cut for an atmospheric distillation column will include a number of kerosene range materials (which are defined in various ways in the art), such as those boiling from 180°C or 190°C (or other kerosene range starting points), and for simplicity this may include lower or higher range temperature materials. However, sulfur content, rather than temperature and the historical definition of kerosene range materials, is the determining factor for the end of the sulfur breakpoint range. A fuel may be produced based on a target sulfur content that is a combination of a sulfur breakpoint and a stream to form a fuel such that the actual sulfur content of the fuel does not exceed the sulfur target.

[0051] In one embodiment, a crude oil feed is separated into streams, one or more liquid portions of these separated streams are processed, and other portions are not processed. A majority volume of all processed and unprocessed liquid streams is then recombined to form a liquid fuel having an actual sulfur content equal to or lower than a target sulfur content. The processing steps include (a) separating the crude oil into a light overhead still gas, a metal-rich residual oil that is insoluble in one or more solvents used for the solvent separation, a sulfur-containing gas, and a liquid fraction above the sulfur breakpoint at or below the breakpoint by one or more distillation and solvent separation steps, (b) processing the liquid fraction at the sulfur breakpoint by one or more hydroprocessing steps, but not processing the liquid fraction at the sulfur breakpoint or insoluble residual oil, to form one or more hydroprocessed streams with reduced sulfur content, but other portions are not processed, (c) mixing the hydroprocessed stream with the liquid fraction at or below the breakpoint to form the fuel having an actual sulfur content at or below the sulfur breakpoint as the target sulfur content.

[0052] In another different embodiment, the present invention provides a method of reducing IMO compliant emissions from a vessel on the high seas, or in an ECA or port, by using fuel produced according to the present invention to adjust the sulfur content to less than the maximum applicable IMO specification at the location where the vessel uses the fuel, whether at sea, in an ECA, or in port. In this way, the vessel can exceed IMO requirements and public expectations.

[0053] In another embodiment, the invention provides a method for a vessel to use the fuel of the invention while in port to generate and sell electricity to a land-based grid, for example, to offset marine or port fuel costs.

[0054] We have found that we can produce low-cost ultra-clean marine fuels while taking into account and regulating flash point in an appropriate manner and significantly exceeding IMO expectations for sulphur and metal limits.

[0055] Thus, we have discovered a technical approach that provides (i) a negligible change in flash point for (ii) a huge environmental benefit (huge SOx and NOx reductions and substantial elimination of harmful metals), especially in relation to the large amounts of fuel consumed by giant cargo ships. Others have failed to discover this.

[0056] The International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea (SOLAS) outlines fuel flashpoints and permitted use on cargo ships. “While to many the 60°C minimum flashpoint for general service fuels given in the SOLAS Convention may appear to be one of the cornerstones of marine legislation, this is only the result of an amendment in 1981. The first three SOLAS Conventions (1914, 1929 and 1948) did not impose any restrictions on flashpoints for petroleum fuels, and even the 1960 Convention only required that for “new” passenger ships, the flashpoint of fuels used in internal combustion engines be no less than 43°C – a provision that was essentially carried over to the current 1974 Convention as originally adopted, citing “Marine Distillate Oil Fuels Issues and implications associated with the harmonization of the minimum flashpoint requirement for marine distillate oil fuels with that of other users” (2012) by Wright et al. provided by Lloyd’s Register FOBAS for the Danish Shipowners’ Association.

[0057] Wright et al note that flash point is an empirical, not a real-world value, and that "flash point values ​​do not, and never have, represented a 'safe' / 'unsafe' boundary line." Thus, flash point has been incorrectly used from the outset of the petroleum industry as a means of distinguishing between those products that require more care and attention in storage and use. Indeed, in marine applications, fuel oil fires are initiated by leaks or pipeline failures that allow fuel to come into contact with surfaces above its auto-ignition temperature, rather than by ignition of vapors. Nonetheless, flash point has been used as a safety parameter in petroleum safety legislation from its inception, albeit sometimes with some arbitrarily set limits or with due regard for the fact that it is an empirical value.

[0058] SOLAS has created an exception for cargo ships. SOLAS states that fuel oil with a flashpoint below 60°C may not be used; however, "the use of fuels with a flashpoint below that otherwise specified in [SOLAS] paragraph 2.1 [e.g., 60°C] (such as crude oil) on board cargo ships may be permitted provided that such fuels are not stored in any machinery space and are approved by the Administration." Note that some countries do not have any flashpoint standards, while others allow relatively low flashpoints for marine applications.

[0059] If necessary, the flash point of the fuel may be adjusted by treatment. As used in the specification and claims, the term "flash point treatment" refers to a composition that increases the flash point when combined with a substance. In one variation, the flash point treatment reduces the vapor pressure of such substance to which it is added to reduce the risk of vapor ignition. In one variation, the flash point adjuster is a solid or liquid additive having a flash point of 60°C or higher that is added to a low flash point fuel to increase the flash point of the fuel. These can include various types of particles and oils. For illustration, high flash point additives for treating carbon-based fuels have been disclosed, including, for illustration, U.S. Pat. No. 8,088,184 (2014) to Hughes et al., which discusses "high flash point diluents," such as those selected from paraffinic base oils having a flash point of at least 200°C, and mixtures or combinations thereof, and specifically mentions Calpar 100 (FP 210°C), Calpar 325 (FP 240°C), and Calpar P950 (FP 257°C), available from Calumet Lubricants Co. of Indianapolis, Ind., as well as paraffinic base oils having a flash point of at least 200°C, and mixtures or combinations thereof.

[0060] We have discovered a technical method that others have not discovered to trade (i) a negligible change in flash point for (ii) a huge environmental benefit (huge SOx and NOx reductions and substantial elimination of harmful metals), especially in relation to the large amounts of fuel consumed by giant cargo ships. BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

[0061] Figure 1 is a schematic representation of the sulfur content of various actual and hypothetical crude oils, showing the breakpoint ranges.

[0062] Figure 2 is a schematic diagram of a process arrangement for processing crude oil to produce a single liquid product useful as a turbine fuel in accordance with the present invention. DETAILED DESCRIPTION

[0063] In one embodiment of the invention, a method for converting a hydrocarbon feedstock (at least a portion of which is a crude oil containing sulfur and metals) into a single liquid product comprises (i) separating said feedstock by one or more distillation and solvent separation steps into a light overhead still gas (which, according to the EIA definition, may include only still gases that are not condensable under atmospheric distillation conditions or more gases, whether or not particular local considerations favor the use of a debutanizer system or otherwise eliminate its cost), a metals-rich residue that is insoluble in one or more solvents used for said solvent separation, a gas comprising sulfur, and a liquid fraction comprising sulfur, which includes a distillate (for some feeds processed as a distillate) and a solvent separation step. The invention relates to a process for preparing a fuel having an actual sulfur content of at least a portion of kerosene range materials (at least a portion of kerosene range materials) and vacuum gas oil range hydrocarbons in the sulfur range of the effluent, (ii) hydrotreating a liquid fraction selected at the sulfur breakpoint cut (wherein preferably only the soluble liquid fraction is selected for hydrotreating) by one or more hydrotreating steps, but not the liquid fraction at or below the sulfur breakpoint cutpoint (and preferably not those portions of any fraction in the solvent used in solvent separation), to form one or more treated streams having a reduced sulfur content, and (iii) combining the untreated fraction with the treated stream to form a fuel having an actual sulfur content at or below the target sulfur content. As used herein, the term "step" or "zone" may refer to a unit operation or area having one or more processing operations having an equipment configuration and / or one or more sections of a unit operation or subzone. Equipment items may include one or more tanks, vessels, distillation columns, separators, reactors or reactor vessels, heaters, exchangers, strippers, pipelines, pumps, compressors, and controllers. In a preferred variation of the invention, substantially all of the hydrocarbon composition of the feed is separated into fractions but then recombined to form the fuel, which is a liquid fuel product comprising a range of hydrocarbons, from the original feed liquefied petroleum gas or, in one variation, naphtha to hydrotreated deasphalted oil, rather than a plurality of hydrocarbon products, except for a hydrocarbon composition comprising (i) lighter overhead gases of the distillate, (ii) the residual oil insolubles, and (iii) those in the stream for sulfur or metal recovery. This range is substantially the entire range of crude oil derived hydrocarbons from C3 or C5 to greater than C20, the initial boiling point of the hydrocarbons being the lowest boiling point of any fraction in the untreated stream combined in the fuel, and the highest boiling point being the highest boiling point of the treated stream combined in the fuel. As used in the specification and claims, the term "untreated" means not subjected to hydrotreatment to reduce or remove sulfur, nitrogen or metals. In one variation, such fuels consist essentially of a range of crude oil derived hydrocarbons from C3 or C5 to greater than C20 or including those having an initial boiling point of about 35°C to about 315°C and above, preferably up to the initial boiling point of the end of the deasphalted oil and the beginning of the deasphalted residue, which are insoluble in the solvent selected for solvent separation.In a more preferred variation, the fuel of the present invention comprises a combination of hydrocarbons ranging from the lowest boiling point portion of the untreated liquid fraction from atmospheric distillation to the highest boiling point portion of the hydrotreated solubles from solvent separation. Thus, the preferred fuel of the present invention is in contrast to conventional gasoline, diesel, kerosene and fuel oil, which have been cut into selected sub-ranges and do not have a meaningful content of the full range of such hydrocarbons. Thus, one embodiment of the present invention is a fuel derived as a single product of processed crude oil, the fuel having an actual sulfur content of 0.5 wt.% or less, preferably 0.1 wt.% or less, comprising substantially the full range of crude oil derived hydrocarbons, from C3 or C5 to greater than C20, the initial boiling point of the hydrocarbons being the lowest boiling point of any fraction of the crude oil under atmospheric distillation conditions and the highest boiling point being the final boiling point of the residual portion of the crude oil that is insoluble in a solvent suitable for solvent separation. In a variation, such fuel comprises essentially the entire range of crude oil derived hydrocarbons from C3 or C5 to greater than C20, said hydrocarbons having an initial boiling point that is the lowest boiling point of any fraction in the untreated stream combined in said fuel and a final boiling point that is the highest boiling point of the treated stream combined in said fuel. In one variation, crude oil is separated into a light overhead still gas, a metal-rich residue that is insoluble in one or more solvents used in the solvent separation, a gas comprising sulfur (including a sulfur-containing purge gas), and a liquid fraction comprising sulfur, including (i) a liquid fraction at or below the sulfur breakpoint and (ii) a liquid fraction above the sulfur breakpoint that may or may not be soluble in the solvent used in the solvent separation, (b) the soluble liquid fraction above the sulfur breakpoint is hydrotreated through one or more hydrotreating steps, but not the liquid fraction or the insoluble fraction at or below the sulfur breakpoint, to form one or more treated streams having a reduced sulfur content, and (c) the untreated fraction is combined with the treated stream to form a fuel having an actual sulfur content equal to or less than a target sulfur content.

[0064] In a variant, this residue is burned in one or more gasifiers to generate electricity and at least a portion of hydrogen for said hydroprocessing and for capturing at least a portion of said metals removed in gasifier solids, or the residue with flue gas sulfur and metals captured is burned in one or more boilers for generating electricity and auxiliary hydrogen power generation unit operation to supply hydrogen for said hydroprocessing. Preferably, all gases including sulfur are directed to one or more common sulfur recovery units.

[0065] By the practice of the present invention, by adjusting the amount of the continuous flow of the combined untreated and treated streams to form the fuel, the actual sulfur content of the fuel can be adjusted to meet a target sulfur content limit specification, such as an IMO specification for marine fuel or a sulfur limit for a combustion gas turbine. For illustration, the target sulfur content of the fuel can be adjusted to meet one or more target IMO specifications inside or outside the ECA, for example, selected from 3.5 wt.%, 0.5 wt.%, 0.1 wt.% or other IMO specifications. The fuel produced according to the method of the present invention can be used in marine engines, combustion gas turbines, combustion heaters such as boilers and other applications.

[0066] In one variation, at least one of the hydrotreated streams is an ultra-low sulfur stream having 10 ppmwt or less sulfur, which is used to adjust the formation of the fuel having an actual sulfur content equal to or lower than the target sulfur content by reducing or adding the amount of the stream to the combination. In another variation, when at least one hydrotreated stream is an ultra-low sulfur stream having less than 10 ppmwt sulfur, and the untreated fraction has a sulfur content exceeding the target sulfur content and the untreated fraction is used as a control for adjustment, the fuel having an actual sulfur content equal to or lower than the target sulfur content is formed by reducing or adding the amount of the untreated fraction to the combination. In another variation, in which a crude oil feed is converted to essentially one liquid fuel product, rather than a plurality of hydrocarbon products, a first hydrotreated stream is produced as a reduced sulfur stream having a sulfur content less than 10 ppmwt sulfur, and a second hydrotreated fuel fraction having a sulfur stream having a sulfur content in the range of 0.12 to 0.18 wt.% sulfur, and an untreated fraction having a sulfur content at or below or above the breakpoint sulfur, in the event that a target sulfur content is exceeded and the first hydrotreated stream or the second hydrotreated stream or both are used as a regulatory control, by reducing or adding the amount of these steam to the combination to form a fuel having an actual sulfur content at or below the target sulfur content.

[0067] In a more preferred embodiment, the sulfur content of one or more crude oils, residual oils and other raw materials is selected, or the processing conditions are adjusted, wherein at least 70% volume of each barrel of the crude oil feed is converted into liquid. When subsequently treated or untreated but combined, the fraction forms a product fuel with sulfur not exceeding the target sulfur content instead of a variety of hydrocarbon products, the sulfur content does not exceed the target sulfur content and no more than 30% feed per barrel of the crude oil is for fuel other than. In a preferred variant of the present invention, at least 80%, more preferably close to 90% or more of the feed volume per barrel of hydrocarbon feed is converted into a liquid fuel product instead of a variety of hydrocarbon products, according to feed composition, hydrogen balance, processing economics and other factors, and the adjustment of processing operating conditions and flow rate, except for one or more very low sulfur streams, used as a regulation to control the final fuel product sulfur content by increasing or decreasing the adjustment flow to reach a level not exceeding the target sulfur content. For material balance and inventory control purposes, the excess adjustment flow can be transferred separately. In these preferred variations of the invention, no more than about 10% to 30% by volume per barrel of the crude feed is captured in the metals-rich resid following atmospheric and vacuum distillation by solvent extraction.

[0068] In another variation, high sulfur fuel oil having a sulfur content greater than a target sulfur content is added, either alone or together with light tight oil, before or during the combination of all treated and untreated fractions to form the fuel. The high sulfur fuel oil may be fed to one or more of the distillation step, the solvent separation step, or the hydrotreating step. In a preferred embodiment, the ultra low sulfur stream has less than 10 ppmwt or less sulfur and the untreated fraction has a sulfur content exceeding the target sulfur content and the untreated portion is used to form a product fuel having an actual sulfur content equal to or less than the target sulfur content by reduction or addition of an amount of such untreated portion to the combination.

[0069] The apparatus for practicing the process of the present invention can have a reduced equipment footprint, in the range of 20% to 30% of the plant footprint of a conventional refinery with typical downstream processing units. Thus, the capital cost per barrel of feed processed is greatly reduced. For example, one specific embodiment of the present invention employs only one or more of atmospheric distillation, vacuum distillation, solvent separation, hydroprocessing, and gasification, with the required auxiliary equipment for capturing sulfur and metals, and without any hydrocarbon processing operations downstream of the hydroprocessing, except for gasification with the required auxiliary equipment to capture sulfur and metals.

[0070] Variants of the processing configuration of the present invention provide high efficiency, low cost operations by effectively integrating the utility island to supply process requirements for hydrogen, steam and fuel gas, as well as electricity, while also providing integrated metal and sulfur capture means. The utility island includes one or more gasifier systems processing heavy metal rich residual oil to capture and eliminate metal contaminants as a component of potential air emission sources, and preferably uses integrated, and therefore lower capital cost, waste gas processing sulfur capture, treatment and removal from all sources of acid gas and acid gas as potential emission sources. The island configuration of the present invention produces hydrogen for the hydroprocessing step, steam and fuel gas for processing electricity and utilization of certain streams (which would otherwise be waste streams) to meet processing requirements through a high efficiency combined cycle power generation unit.

[0071] A variation of this embodiment of the invention addresses the ability to process light crude oil for hydrogenation to reduce sulfur and metal content for decontamination purposes when the light tight oil does not contain sufficient heavy hydrocarbons in its bottom fraction and residue to provide a process balance for hydrocarbon processing and corresponding hydrogen generation. This method includes the steps of adding the light crude oil alone or mixed with other feeds to any or all of the heavier feedstocks for atmospheric distillation, vacuum distillation or solvent separation processing.

[0072] In one variation, the design of the equipment for the vacuum distillation, solvent separation, hydrotreating and gasification operations downstream of the atmospheric distillation is sized to have an added or spare capacity to process high sulfur fuel oil from a different source or additional heavier residual oil from a different source outside the cell limits of the operation to form a fuel having an actual sulfur content at or below a target fuel sulfur content limit level and to capture at least a portion of the sulfur and metals from the additional heavy residual oil.

[0073] In another embodiment, the present invention provides a method for using the fuel of the present invention in a vessel in port to reduce local emissions, and for generating and selling electricity to a land-based grid. In one variant, the present invention provides a technical method for reducing emissions at or near a port, comprising (a) a technical analysis to determine sulfur or metal emissions per kilowatt-hour per hour (KWH) of electricity generated from an onshore power generation facility, typically supplied to a grid at or near the port (for illustration, including emissions from a vessel using a local power supply when in port and connected to that grid) and (b) a technical analysis to determine sulfur or metal emissions per KWH generated by the same vessel when generating electricity on a ship at the location of (a), then comparing (a) with (b), and if (b) the emissions generated by the ship's power generation are lower than (a) the local source of electricity, then reducing the emissions of all or part of the ship's power generation to the grid in the ship's tender. This embodiment is particularly useful for reducing environmental emissions when the locally supplied electricity is from certain types of coal-fired sources or heavy crude oil or residual oil for power generation, where lower emission options are not available for local power generation. Without compensation, then tendering by the ship to the local grid may not be possible if the KWH cost of the ship’s electricity generation is higher than the KWH cost of the local grid, or if such tendering by the ship to the local grid is not profitable for the ship, unless offset by port fees or other charges, unless offset by emission reduction credits, such as subsidies paid for low-emission electricity generation.

[0074] If the vessel's bidding to the local grid is profitable, then the vessel can offset or reduce the fuel costs incurred at sea by the revenue generated by bidding to the onshore grid while using all or part of the onboard electricity generated by using the fuel of the present invention in port. Such revenue generated by bidding to the grid in port can offset the cost of fuel at sea to a level that may result in actual sailing at sea fuel costs of these new fuels being lower than the cost of high sulfur fuel oil at sea, depending on the duration of the stop in port.

[0075] Figure 1 is a schematic diagram of sulfur content graphs for various actual and hypothetical crude oils showing a range of breakpoints. Exemplary crude sulfur profiles 4, 5, 6 are plotted based on center points of actual data extracted from a publication entitled "Sulfur Compounds in Crude Oil, Washington DC" published by UNT by Rall et al. Crude sulfur hypothetical profiles 1, 2, 3 are derived in part from actual data adapted from various sources, including "Petroleum Refining, Crude Oil Petroleum Products Process Flowsheets" (1995) by JP Wauquier, published by Institut Francais du Petrole.

[0076] Figure 1 It illustrates how the definition of "breakpoints" for different crude oils is suggested for the processing configuration of the present invention. Figure 1 The diagram shows that the breakpoint refers to the point where the change in sulfur content per unit of production change (as the operation rises) is no longer essentially horizontal or flat, but at the breakpoint, as the amount of cutting increases slightly, the sulfur content begins to increase rapidly, or increases exponentially, resulting in a large change in the rate of rise per unit of operation. Also at or after the breakpoint, depending on the type of crude feedstock, the type and composition of sulfur-containing compounds and the complexity change. The breakpoint enables determination of how best to bypass cost-intensive hydroprocessing while producing fuel that meets the target sulfur content limit specification to determine the efficiency of the operation. That is, the breakpoint can be the maximum sulfur content of the atmospheric original tower fraction, which is away from or further downstream processing to reduce the sulfur content, such as being directed away from hydroprocessing. The fraction above the breakpoint is directed to downstream processing to reduce the sulfur content, while the fraction at or below the breakpoint is not treated, thereby saving a lot of operations. In conventional refining, the cut is fixed by temperature range rather than sulfur content. To illustrate the end-use requirements, the target sulfur content can determine the choice of the breakpoint. If the breakpoint is set too high, then the excess flow of the higher sulfur content untreated stream cannot be easily offset by increasing the flow of the low sulfur hydrotreated stream.

[0077] Figure 2 A general overview of another embodiment of the present invention is given and the major components of a process operation for producing a single liquid product suitable for use as a fuel are shown in simplified form. Figure 2 A process combining atmospheric and vacuum distillation, solvent separation, hydrotreating and gasification is shown to produce a single low sulfur, substantially metal-free fuel product.

[0078] After pretreatment (such as desalting), the contaminated crude oil containing sulfur, nitrogen and metals flows through pipeline 2 to the process, which is preferred for crude oil. In this example, the crude oil feed 2 can be a single crude oil or a mixture of one or more crude oils or a mixture of crude oil and residual oil (such as high sulfur fuel oil). The feed 2 is directed to an atmospheric distillation column 100, where the feed is separated into a light overhead gas 4 and various cuts. The light overhead gas 4 includes non-condensable stationary gas 6, which can be used as a process fuel or can be captured for other uses. In a preferred variant, capital expenditures associated with a stabilization system are avoided with respect to such overhead gas 4; however, depending on local requirements, such as maximum H2S specifications for special marine fuels, a stabilization system may be included. In Figure 2In the example shown, the multiple cuts would include one or more streams within these ranges (1) unstable wild run naphtha at line 16 via line 4, (2) a sulfur breakpoint cut at line 18, (3) light distillates at line 24, (4) middle distillates at line 26, (5) first heavy distillates at line 28, and (6) atmospheric residue at line 30.

[0079] In different usages in the art, the same or similar cuts are given different meanings in different parts of the world, and these meanings are often different, overlapping, conflicting, and confusing. As used in the specification and claims, the following are designated: (a) "naphtha" means a carbonaceous composition ranging from C3 having at least three (3) carbons (such as propane) to those having an initial boiling point (IBP) of about 175°C (about 350°F), without lighter boiling compounds such as methane or lighter, (b) "stable naphtha" means naphtha or other naphtha series material used as a blending material for fuels from which lighter boiling compounds (such as butane or propane or lighter) have been almost completely removed, for example, in a conventional refinery, the bottoms stream from a naphtha debutanizer distillation tower would be stable naphtha, (c) "unstable naphtha" means naphtha from which no C4 or lighter components have been removed; for example, in a conventional refinery, the raw stream from a naphtha debutanizer would be unstable naphtha. (d) "unstable wild straight run naphtha" means a carbonaceous composition recovered from atmospheric distillation ranging from at least three (3) carbons C3 (such as propane) up to those having an initial boiling point (IBP) of about 175°C (about 350°F), without lighter boiling compounds (such as methane or lighter), which may include the atmospheric distillation overhead fraction, (e) "wild naphtha" in the context of hydroprocessing means an unstable lighter fraction hydroprocessor effluent recovered from a fractionator or other separator, operatively considered to be part of a hydroprocessing zone which recovers one or more heavier fractions at or near the bottom of the separator, such as a distillate range, a heavy oil range, or other feed to a separator that is heavier than the naphtha fraction and is unstable, (f) "breakpoint cut" is defined herein above, and Figure 1Examples are shown in, (g) "light distillate above the breakpoint" or "light distillate" where the initial sulfur content exceeds the highest sulfur content of the breakpoint cut and accordingly has a boiling point (IBP) that exceeds the highest final boiling point of the breakpoint cut, (h) "middle distillate" refers to a distillate between light distillate and heavy distillate, separated into cuts based on a preferred distillation column design; for example, the middle distillate cut can be eliminated and mixed with light distillate or heavy distillate, (i) "first heavy distillate" refers to the heaviest fraction in an atmospheric distillation unit, whose sulfur content and boiling point range are determined with reference to one or more operating factors (such as the sulfur composition of the distillation unit feed, the severity of the crude column operation, and downstream hydroprocessing conditions), (j) "first heavy distillate" refers to the heaviest fraction of an atmospheric distillation unit having a sulfur content and boiling point range. The sulfur content and boiling point range are determined by reference to the sulfur composition and sulfur cutoff of the distillation unit feed and by reference to one or more operating factors (such as the severity of the crude tower operation and the severity of downstream hydroprocessing conditions), (k) "second heavy distillate" refers to the lightest fraction of the vacuum distillation tower, and the sulfur content and boiling point range are determined by reference to the sulfur composition and sulfur cutoff of the distillation unit feed and by reference to one or more operating factors (such as the severity of the crude tower operation and the severity of the downstream distillate hydroprocessing conditions), and (l) "atmospheric residue", "vacuum residue", "vacuum gas oil", including "light vacuum gas oil" and "heavy vacuum gas oil", "solvent separation" and "hydroprocessing" and other terms and variations of these terms are known to those skilled in the crude oil processing art.

[0080] Preferably, if the target sulfur content of the fuel combination 600 is 0.1 wt.% or less sulfur and the treated stream 70 sulfur content is less than 10 ppmwt, then the combination of steam (1) wild straight run naphtha destabilized at line 16 via line 4 and (2) the sulfur breakpoint intercepted at line 18 will contain less than 0.06 wt.% to 0.08 wt.% sulfur, wherein the flow rates of the combination of streams 10 and 70 are adjusted so that the fuel combination 600 does not exceed the target sulfur content.

[0081] exist Figure 2 In the embodiment of the present invention, atmospheric residue is fed to vacuum distillation column 200 via line 30 to produce (1) a second heavy distillate at line 32, (2) a light vacuum gas oil at line 36, (3) a heavy vacuum gas oil at line 38, and (4) a vacuum residue at line 50. The vacuum residue is directed to solvent separation 300 via line 50 to produce (1) a deasphalted oil at line 80 and asphalt at line 90, which is a heavy residue rich in metals.

[0082] Figure 2An integrated hydroprocessing system 400 is shown that includes two hydroprocessing zones, a distillate hydroprocessing zone 430 and a heavy oil hydroprocessing zone 460. Integrated hydroprocessing systems are known in the art and are preferred for this application. However, mild hydroprocessing conditions at relatively low pressures in the range of about 117 bar to 138 (1700 to 2000 psi) are sufficient to carry out hydrodesulfurization and hydrodemetallization in zones 430 and 460.

[0083] The light distillate 24, the middle distillate 26, the first heavy distillate 28 and the second heavy distillate 32 are preferably fed to an integrated hydroprocessing system 400 and treated with hydrogen in the presence of a catalyst under hydroprocessing conditions to form a distillate hydroprocessing zone 430 effluent stream in line 60. This hydrotreater effluent 60 includes materials in the following ranges: (1) wild naphtha, expected to have a boiling point range from above C5 (five carbon containing composition) to about 175°C (about 350°F) and (2) ultra low sulfur diesel, preferably having a sulfur content of less than 10 ppmwt, a reduced sulfur stream formed by combining the treated distillate streams, which includes the light distillate 24, the middle distillate 26, the first heavy distillate 28 and the second heavy distillate 32. Those skilled in the art of hydroprocessing understand that byproducts of hydroprocessing in zone 430 may include sulfur-containing gases (such as hydrogen sulfide, hydrogen-rich off-gas), at least a portion of which is treated to remove sulfur and recycled as hydrogen addition to the distillate hydrotreater zone 430 or the heavy oil hydrotreater zone 460 or both, and typically small amounts of liquid petroleum gases.

[0084] The light vacuum gas oil 36 , heavy vacuum gas oil 38 , and deasphalted oil 80 are preferably also fed to the integrated hydrotreater system 400 and treated with hydrogen in the presence of a catalyst under hydroprocessing conditions to form an effluent stream 70 of the heavy vacuum gas oil hydroprocessing zone 460 . Such a hydrotreater effluent includes materials in the range of (1) wild naphtha having an expected boiling range from above C5 (compositions containing five carbons) to about 175°C (about 350°F) and (2) ultra low sulfur diesel, preferably with a sulfur content of less than 10 ppmwt, being a first heavy oil hydroprocessing zone reduced by a first portion of a combination of treated distillate vapors including light vacuum gas oil 36, heavy vacuum gas oil 38 and deasphalted oil 80, and (3) a second reduced sulfur stream, preferably with a sulfur content of 0.12-0.18 wt.% sulfur, formed by a second portion of a combination of treated distillate vapors including light vacuum gas oil 36, heavy vacuum gas oil 38 and deasphalted oil 80. Those skilled in the art of hydroprocessing will appreciate that byproducts of the hydroprocessing in zone 460 may include gases containing sulfur gases, such as hydrogen sulfide, hydrogen-rich off-gas, at least a portion of which is treated for sulfur and recycled as hydrogen addition to either distillate hydroprocessing zone 430 or heavy oil hydroprocessing zone 460 or both, and typically small amounts of liquid petroleum gas.

[0085] Untreated stream 10 and one or more hydrotreated liquid streams via lines 60 and 70 are combined at 600 to form a low sulfur, substantially metal-free fuel product, where "combined" means formed by in-line stream mixing or other intimate combination. In one variation, unstabilized wild straight run naphtha via 4 and 16 and sulfur break cut via 18 are combined at 100 without added treatment and then formed into a fuel combination at 600 by combining with one or more effluents from the fraction hydrotreater zone 430 comprising wild. Naphtha and ultra low sulfur diesel and one or more effluents from the heavy oil hydroprocessing zone 460 include wild naphtha, ultra low sulfur diesel and a second reduced sulfur stream formed in the heavy oil hydroprocessing zone 460. In another variation, for hydroprocessing zone 400, the effluents of zones 430 and 460 are combined to form a single stream, as are lines 60 and 70 combined within that zone (not shown), which variation is useful in situations where separation of the effluents of hydroprocessors 430 and 460 is not preferred. Preferably, vacuum gas oil hydroprocessing section 460 has an overhead system stream and a bottoms system stream, a portion of the stream being diesel boiling range material, which may be a relatively small amount compared to the combined diesel contributed by either zone 430 or 460 to combination 600. The combined diesel side hydroprocessing section 430 also has a wild naphtha side stream, either alone or as a portion of the overhead system stream and the bottoms system stream, comprising low sulfur diesel that is directed to block 600 or used for conditioning or other purposes.

[0086] The deasphalted 300 bottom heavy residue 90 comprising bitumen and metal-rich heavy residue is fed to an integrated gasification-combined cycle system 500 comprising one or more gasifiers for partial oxidation of said heavy residue 90 with steam and oxygen and optionally a carbonaceous slurry quench to form syngas, at least a portion of which is converted to hydrogen, which is directed via line 502 for use in a hydrotreater system 400 comprising a distillate hydrotreater 430 and a heavy oil hydrotreater 460 and for use in the combustion gas turbine of a combined cycle power unit within the gasification system 500 for power generation and hot turbine gas in 504 for processing purposes and other purposes, and also includes a heat recovery generator to recover heat from the hot gas turbine gas to produce steam to drive a steam turbine for additional power generation directed via 504 as electricity. Each gasifier also produces metal-rich soot, which may be in the form of particulate matter containing metal contaminants derived from crude oil and / or heavy feeds, which solids are directed from each gasifier via line 506 for metal removal. The support system includes one or more gas processing units, and all sour gas streams (whether acid gas or sour gas) from all unit operations are fed via 508 for sulfur removal. Preferably, such a sulfur removal system is part of a utility island, of which the gasification system is a part. More preferably, one or more sour gas streams are used for commercial sulfuric acid production as part of the total sulfur removal. The gasification system 500 will typically include an acid gas removal unit and a sour CO shift system, which are optimized in terms of capacity and configuration to produce the required hydrogen from at least a portion of the raw syngas produced within the gasification system.

[0087] exist Figure 2In the illustrated integrated hydroprocessing system 400 variant, the gas 502 of the supplemental hydrogen from the gasification system 500 is compressed and heated to an effective hydroprocessing operating temperature, pressure, space velocity and pressure in the internal circulating hydrogen in the hydroprocessing block 400 in the amount required for hydroprocessing, which are adjusted based on the selected catalyst and other conditions known in the art to achieve the desired desulfurization and demetallization levels. This prepared hydrogen 502 (as well as circulating hydrogen) is first deployed in the heavy oil hydroprocessing zone 460 (high pressure zone). The effluent of the heavy oil hydroprocessing zone 460, including the liquid and hydrogen-containing gas treated by hydroprocessing, is separated in a high pressure separator (not shown), these liquids are collected in the area 460 and the hydrogen-containing gas is recovered and enters the distillate hydroprocessor 430 for hydroprocessing in this low pressure zone via pipeline 410. Hydroprocessed liquids including acid gas and sour gas from hydroprocessor zone 430 and purge gas enter heavy oil hydroprocessor zone 460 via line 412 where they are substantially combined. The hydroprocessed process liquids of zones 430 and 460 can be separated via lines 60 and 70 and used as input to combined fuel 600 or added as a trim to control the sulfur content of combined zone 600 or taken out (not shown) respectively, depending on process sulfur and material balance requirements. In the illustrated integrated hydroprocessing variant, purge gas 420 of zones 430 and 460 is directed via line 420 to utility island 500 including a sulfur recovery system and optional gasification or boiler. Figure 2 Not shown, but known to those skilled in the art of hydroprocessing, are various auxiliary high, medium and low pressure gas-liquid separators, stream heaters, gas recycle and purge lines, reflux drums for gas or lamps and liquid separation, compressors, cooling systems and other auxiliary applications. Also, if not located in the usual utility island but in the hydroprocessing zone, various amines or other sulfur recovery agent absorbers and stripping systems for acid gas or acid gas treatment will be included in the hydroprocessing zone 400.

[0088] The parameters for selecting the hydroprocessing catalyst and adjusting the processing conditions of the hydroprocessing zone 400 are within the skill range of the personnel engaged in the petroleum refining industry, and the practice of the hydroprocessing section of the present invention does not need to be explained additionally. In the reaction zone of the distillate hydroprocessor 430 and the heavy oil hydroprocessor 460, the hydroprocessing catalyst used includes any catalyst composition that can be used for catalytic hydrocarbon feed hydrogenation to increase its hydrogen content and / or remove sulfur, nitrogen, oxygen, phosphorus and metal heteroatom pollutants. The specific catalyst type used and the various layer configurations and the selected hydroprocessing conditions will depend on the hydrocarbon composition, sulfur and metal content of each feed processed by each unit, and the heavy carbon residue, the sulfur and metal content of the expected reduction of the product stream from each zone. This catalyst can be selected from any catalyst that can be used for hydrocarbon feed hydroprocessing; However, in the practice of the preferred embodiment of the present invention, the operating conditions are adjusted to avoid or minimize ring saturation or hydroconversion. Publication number US20140221713A1 (US13 / 758,429) 2014 by Baldassari et al., incorporated herein by reference, describes various suitable hydrotreating catalysts and suitable hydrotreating processes, including variants of integrated hydrotreating units. Baldassari et al. further summarizes variants of catalyst compositions and ranges of conditions for distillate and heavy oil hydrotreating, and distinguishes between conditions for hydrocracking and residue hydroconversion, all of which are known to those skilled in the art of hydrotreating. "Revamping Diesel Hydrotreaters For Ultra-Low Sulfur Using IsoTherming Technology" by Ackerson et al. discusses unit design, catalyst selection, hydrogen consumption, and other operating conditions for removing sulfur by hydrogenation to produce products with sulfur contents below 8 ppm using a high activity Ni / Mo catalyst. Advanced Refining Technologies Catalog Special Edition Issue No. 113 / 2013, page 6, “Optimizing Hydroprocessing Catalyst Systems for Hydrocracking and Diesel Hydrotreating Applications, Flexibility Through Catalyst” by Shiflet et al. also discusses the use of high activity CoMo catalysts for hydrotreating to 10 ppm or less to remove unhindered sulfur and high activity NiMo catalysts to retain sterically hindered sulfur.

[0089] exist Figure 2In another variation shown, the sulfur content of the feed 2 is measured by determining an indexed sulfur profile breakpoint and rate of rise, for illustration, a sulfur content breakpoint in the range of 0.06-0.08 wt.% (or higher based on consideration of the relative flow rates of the untreated and hydrotreated steam and their respective sulfur contents) and using this profile to control the adjustment of the atmospheric distillation 100 to maximize the available amount of unstable wild straight run naphtha 16 and sulfur breakpoint cut 18, 16 and 18 can flow to be mixed by the streams or through the available product collection area 600 to combine without treatment, and determine or, if necessary, reduce (1) the light distillate 24, the middle distillate 26, the first heavy distillate 28 or the second heavy distillate 32 entering the distillate hydroprocessing zone 430, or (2) the light vacuum gas oil 36, the heavy vacuum gas oil 38 or the deasphalted oil 80 flowing into the heavy oil hydrotreater 460, which stream is directed to the hydroprocessing in the added or reduced amount for treatment to form a fuel product 600 having an actual sulfur content equal to or below the target sulfur content limit level. In another variation, the determination can be used to control the maximum amount of streams other than the untreated unstabilized wild straight run naphtha 16 and the untreated sulfur breakpoint cut 18 to determine the amount of stream to be directed to the hydroprocessing to form the fuel 600 having an actual sulfur content equal to or below the target sulfur content limit level. That is, the addition of any amount of (1) a stream of light distillate 24, middle distillate 26, first heavy distillate 28, or second heavy distillate 32 or (2) a stream of light vacuum gas oil 36, heavy vacuum gas oil 38, or deasphalted oil 80 to heavy oil hydrotreater 460 to the distillate hydrotreating zone 430 at various flow rates to hydrotreating 400 can increase or decrease the amount to cause adjustment of the sulfur content of the hydrotreating zone 400 effluent 60 or 70, or both, which is combined with the untreated stream 10 at 600.

[0090] In one variation, a fuel product 600 having an actual sulfur content at or below a target sulfur content limit level is adjusted for final actual product 600 sulfur content by increasing or decreasing the amount of a combination zone 600 where one or more of any of the following (a), (b), or (c) is unstable: (a) wild straight run naphtha 16 or sulfur break cut 18, each of which may contain some sulfur content because they are not treated to remove sulfur, or (b) streams flowing into or out of a distillate hydrotreater 430, such as treated light distillate 24, middle distillate 26, first heavy distillate 28, and second heavy distillate 32, or (c) streams flowing into or out of a heavy oil hydrotreater, such as treated light vacuum gas oil 36, heavy vacuum gas oil 38, and deasphalted oil 80, wherein such adjustment is based on a measurement of the relative sulfur content contribution of each stream 60 or 70 to the combination 600.

[0091] In one embodiment, light tight oil or condensate, or a combination of light tight oil and the like (such as non-associated gas and shale gas production condensate) has a low metal content and a sulfur content below the target sulfur content limit level. The fuel 600 is combined with one or more of the following (a) to (f), wherein (a) a feed to atmospheric distillation 100 or vacuum distillation 200, solvent separation 300, any feed to the hydroprocessor 430 of the light distillate 24, the middle distillate 26, the first heavy distillate 28 or the second heavy distillate 32, or any feed to the heavy oil hydroprocessor 460 of the light vacuum gas oil 36, the heavy vacuum gas oil 38 or the deasphalted oil 80, or (b) a feed consisting of unstable wild straight run naphtha 16 and Stream 10 formed by sulfur breakpoint cut 18, with no added processing, or (c) a stream formed by a distillate hydrotreater, including wild naphtha and ultra low sulfur diesel, or (d) a stream formed by a heavy oil hydrotreater, including wild naphtha, ultra low sulfur diesel and a second reduced sulfur stream, or (e) the combined effluent 70 of hydroprocessing unit 400, is directed to finished fuel 600, or (f) is otherwise added to fuel produced in a facility, either within or outside the fence of the facility producing such fuel, to form a finished fuel.

[0092] exist Figure 2In one variation shown, the sulfur content of the fuel product 600 is controlled at or below a target sulfur content limit level by (a) feeding unstable wild straight run naphtha 16 and sulfur breakpoint cut 18 to the combination 600 without adding treatment to any such stream via pipeline 10, and then (b) adjusting the actual product sulfur content 600 by increasing or decreasing the amount of any one or more of the following (1) or (2) combinations of light distillates 24, middle distillates 26, first heavy distillates 28, or second heavy distillates 32 to the distillate hydroprocessing zone 430, or (2) light vacuum gas oil 36, heavy vacuum gas oil 38, or deasphalted oil 80 to the heavy oil hydrotreater 460, and (c) then decreasing the amount of any one or more of the following (1) or (2) combinations of light distillates 24, middle distillates 26, first heavy distillates 28, or second heavy distillates 32 to the distillate hydroprocessing zone 430, and (c) then decreasing the amount of any one or more of the following (1) or (2) combinations of deasphalted oil 80, wherein (1) ) a stream from the distillate hydroprocessing zone 430 via line 60 formed from the light distillate 24, the middle distillate 26, the first heavy distillate 28 or the second heavy distillate 32, (2) a stream from the heavy oil hydrotreater 460 via line 70 formed from the light vacuum gas oil 36, the heavy vacuum gas oil 38 and the deasphalted oil 80, if any or all of these are required to increase the sulfur level of the actual product 600 to the target sulfur level for any reason, or (d) increasing the amount of any one or more combinations of the following (1) or (2), wherein (1) the stream from the distillate hydroprocessing zone 430 via line 60, or (2) the stream from the heavy oil hydrotreater 460 via line 70, if any or all of these are required to reduce the sulfur level of the actual product 600 to or below the target sulfur level for any reason. As a result of this advancement, multiple sulfur grades can be efficiently produced, such as 500 ppmwt or lower sulfur fuels for marine and land-fired gas turbines, or different ranges for the same application in different locations requiring different target sulfur contents.

[0093] In a variation of using high sulfur fuel oil having a sulfur content above the target sulfur content limit level of the finished fuel of the combination 600, the high sulfur fuel oil is fed as part of one or more of the various feeds to one or more of each unit operation. The high sulfur fuel oil may be added to (a) feed line 2 to atmospheric distillation 100 or line 30 to vacuum distillation 200, or (b) line 50 solvent separation 300, or (c) line 20 to distillate hydrotreater 430, either alone or in combination with one or more of light distillate 24, middle distillate 26, first heavy distillate 28, or second heavy distillate 32, fed to the distillate hydrotreater 430, or (d) line 40 to heavy oil hydrotreater 460, either alone or in combination with one or more of light vacuum gas oil 36, heavy vacuum gas oil 38, and deasphalted oil 80, to form a fuel combination 600 having an actual sulfur content at or below the target sulfur content limit level. Those skilled in the art of refining understand that in practicing one or more of these variations with respect to the use of high sulfur fuel oil as a feed and the selection of its feed point, its sulfur content, asphaltene content and other factors, the properties of the high sulfur fuel oil feed and compatibility with co-processed crude oil or other feeds, vessel space and energy consumption, asphaltene content, content of undissolved components, gum formation and other efficiency issues will be considered.

[0094] In another variation, the clean fuel of the combined 600 zone is formed by adding a high sulfur fuel oil, which may have a sulfur content greater than a target sulfur content limit level, to one or more of the following (a), (b), or (c), wherein (a) stream 10 is formed from unstable wild straight run naphtha 16 and sulfur breakpoint 18, depending on the sulfur content of the high sulfur fuel oil, without added processing, (b) stream 60 is formed from a fraction hydrotreater 430, including wild naphtha and ultra low sulfur diesel range materials, or (c) stream 70 is formed from a heavy oil hydrotreater 460, including wild naphtha, ultra low sulfur diesel and a second reduced sulfur stream or a combined effluent 70 from the hydroprocessing zone 400, such that the fuel 600 has an actual sulfur content level at or below the target sulfur content limit.

[0095] In a preferred variation of using high sulfur fuel oil in preparing the fuel composition 600, the sulfur content of such high sulfur fuel oil is determined and the high sulfur fuel oil is then fed as part of the feed 50 to the solvent separation unit to form part of the deasphalted oil stream 80 or is combined with one or more distillate streams of the light distillate 24, the middle distillate 26, the first heavy distillate 28 or the second heavy distillate 32 to be fed as part of the feed 20 to the distillate hydrotreater 430 or is combined with one or more heavy oil streams of the light vacuum gas oil 36, the heavy vacuum gas oil 38 and the deasphalted oil 80 or is combined with both the distillate streams and the heavy oil streams to form part of the feed to either the distillate hydrotreater 430 or the heavy oil hydrotreater 460 or both, as determined by the sulfur content of the high sulfur fuel oil, to optimize the adjustment of the hydrotreating conditions in the zones 430 or 460, or to adjust both zones, to form a fuel having an actual sulfur content at or below the target sulfur content limit level.

[0096] In another embodiment of the present invention, clean fuels at or below the sulfur content limit specification can be formed by using heavy residual oil, which includes normal atmospheric residue or heavier high sulfur fuel oil, which can have a density or sulfur or metal content that is out of specification or within the typical standards for high sulfur fuel oil. Typically, due to market considerations, such heavy residual oil can be obtained from a supply source that is different from the battery limit of the fuel plant. The heavy residual oil having a sulfur content greater than the target sulfur content limit level of the fuel 600 is fed to one or more of (a) or (b), wherein (a) the vacuum distillation column 200, alone or in combination with the atmospheric residual oil feed to the vacuum column 200 via line 30, to produce at least a portion of any one or all of the second heavy distillate 32, light vacuum gas oil 36, heavy vacuum gas oil or vacuum residual oil 50, or (b) the solvent separation 300, alone or in combination with the vacuum residual oil feed to the solvent separation 300 via line 50, to produce at least a portion of the deasphalted oil 80 or asphalt 90 having heavy metal-rich residual oil, which is transferred to the gasification system 500 for gasification, sulfur recovery and other auxiliary processing. This heavy residual oil can also be mixed with asphalt via line 90 as a feed to the utility island 500. In a variation, when an untreated high sulfur fuel having a relatively high sulfur (in excess of 0.5 wt.%) or high metal content is used without the treatment of the present invention for adjusting the sulfur content of the fuel 600, such use is a relatively small amount of adjustment to ensure that the combination 600 does not exceed the target sulfur content limit when no treatment is used.

[0097] Shows various intermediate individual products Figure 2The flow chart is used to illustrate and understand the major products and byproducts in the effluent of each unit operation depicted. The selected separation or treatment by each unit operation varies depending on the selected crude oil and feed and the optimization of the intermediates produced to produce fuel at or below the target sulfur specification. For example, if the ultra low temperature diesel produced in zone 430 is not separated and all hydroprocessed materials are combined in line 70, as shown in FIG. Figure 2 As shown, the effluents 60 and 70 from the hydrotreaters 430 and 460 can then be combined in the hydroprocessing zone 400 using a common gas-liquid separator (not shown) with only the gases removed. Alternatively, if it is a process objective to separate or remove a portion of the wild naphtha or ULSD for regulatory control of the sulfur content of the fuel in the final combination zone 600 or for other reasons, the effluents 60 and 70 from the hydrotreaters 430 and 460 can be sent, either individually or in combination, to a stripper or fractionator to enable the removal of a fraction of the wild naphtha or ULSD.

[0098] Although various embodiments of the present invention have been described, it should be understood that they are merely illustrative and not limiting. For illustration, when the flash point of the fuel is not considered, an untreated light tight oil or condensate, or a combination of untreated light oils or condensates, having a low metal content and a sulfur content below a target sulfur content, is added as a combination of the untreated fraction and the treated stream to form a fuel having an actual sulfur content equal to or below the target sulfur content. As used herein, the term "light tight oil" or "LTO" refers to a wellhead condensate or shale gas condensate having (i) a sulfur content in the range of 0.1 wt.% to 0.2 wt.%, and (ii) a density, API (Deg) in the range of 38 to 57, and (iii) a wide range of sources based on the hydrocarbon range. LTO typically has an expected overlapping distillation cut range, in terms of weight percentage by mass, of (a) 5 to 20 wt.% liquefied petroleum gas, (b) 10 to 35 wt.% naphtha, (c) 15 to 30 wt.% kerosene, (d) 15 to 25% diesel, (e) medium vacuum gas oil, and (f) none (0%) to 10% heavy residue.

[0099] In one variation, the invention addresses the co-processing of (i) and (ii) to produce a low cost fuel having a low metal content and a sulfur content below a target sulfur content, wherein (i) a crude oil having the quality of an untreated light tight oil or condensate, or a combination of light tight oil or condensate, such as when from an available oil production pool outside the cell limits of the fuel production plant of the invention, and (ii) one or more other crude oil feeds to the process of the invention. Such light tight crude oil, none (e.g., 0% or very low heavy residue) may not contain sufficient heavy hydrocarbons in its bottom fraction to provide a processing balance for desulfurization or other hydroprocessing of its residue range, nor a corresponding residue sufficient to support processing hydrogen production to enable economically effective processing of such light crude oil for hydroprocessing to reduce sulfur and metals decontamination or sufficient lubricity to support use in certain types of engines.

[0100] The embodiments of the novel fuel of the present invention can be better understood with reference to the ISO 8217 standard issued by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO). ISO 8217 describes the categories and detailed specifications of a series of marine residual fuels consumed on board. The specifications recognize that, as the basis for their development, changes in crude oil supply, refining methods and other conditions. These specifications indicate that they take into account various international requirements for characteristics such as sulfur content. The most stringent ISO 8217 at present is RMA 10, and the interpretation of the specifications and claims should be based on this. Based on the simulated composition of the novel fuel of the present invention (crude oil is divided into fractions by a simulation model, some of which are hydrotreated, and the residual oil of these untreated and treated sections is excluded and then reconfigured), these novel ones meet and / or exceed all ISO RMA 10 specifications except flash point, which, for cargo ships, is an exception to the flash point requirements of SOLAS for cargo ships, and these fuels have novel characteristics or improvements, and we claim that these novel fuels are distinguished from these marine fuels from residual oil.

[0101] In one variation, we provide an improved fuel that meets or exceeds all ISO RMA 10 (ISO 2817-10) specifications except for flash point and having any or all of the following distinguishing features: (a) a sulfur content of 0.50% m / m (wt.%) or less, preferably in the range of 0.05-0.20 m / m (wt.%), (b) 5.0 mg / Kg (ppmwt) or less of metals, preferably 1.0 mg / Kg (1.0 ppmwt) or less, for example 0.2 mg / Kg (0.2 ppmwt), and (c) a flash point not higher than 60°C, as well as other improved features superior to the ISO RMA10 specification. In variations, these novel fuels have one or more of these additional distinguishing features: (a) viscosity not exceeding 10 cSt, (b) pour point of 0 (zero) °C or lower, (c) density range of 820 to 880 Kg / M3, (d) CCAI not greater than 800, (e) sodium of 20 mg / Kg or lower, preferably 10 mg / Kg or lower. All of the above are determined by the test or calculation methods specified in ISO 2817-10. This fuel includes a series of hydrocarbons having an initial boiling point of naphtha, the highest boiling point being the highest boiling point of its components, which are soluble in a solvent suitable for solvent separation (such as heptane). Depending on the adjustment of feed composition and operating conditions, metals can be reduced to 100 ppbwt.

[0102] We have found that we can produce very low sulphur and metal fuels in a cost effective manner which fall within the SOLAS exceptions to the flash point requirements for cargo ships. If flash point treatment is required for other uses, then the flash point treatment is to a flash point of 60°C or higher, or such requirements as are known in the art.

[0103] The low viscosity, low pour point fuels of the present invention are used in marine engines to avoid or reduce the energy consumption associated with heating conventional residual oils to enable pumping and handling at gas stations or offshore ports. Heavy residual oils are thick and need to be heated and kept hot because they have relatively high pour points and high viscosities during storage, pumping and feeding to marine engines, and this heating consumes energy.

[0104] Table 1 below shows two fuel variants of the present invention, one having a very low sulfur content of 0.1 wt.% and the other having an even lower sulfur content of 0.05 wt.% compared to ISO RMA 10, as shown in Table 1 below:

[0105] Table 1

[0106]

[0107] The class of fuels of the present invention having the characteristics shown in Table 1 is further distinguished by including substantially the entire range of crude oil derived hydrocarbons from C3 or C5 to greater than C20, the initial boiling point of said hydrocarbons being the lowest boiling point of any fraction of said crude oil under atmospheric distillation conditions, and the highest boiling point being the final boiling point of the remaining portion of said crude oil that is insoluble in a solvent suitable for solvent separation. In contrast, residual oils (whether vacuum distilled residual oils, solvent deasphalted residual oils, or other cokers, etc.) do not contain such a wide range of hydrocarbons, but are limited to very heavy materials.

[0108] According to the disclosure in the specification and claims, the present invention enables the manufacture of ultra-clean fuels that meet or exceed the standards for compatibility with existing marine reciprocating engines, but are also compatible with advanced combustion gas turbines that can be used for marine applications. Such advanced turbine engines are available now, but are generally land-based. Once these advanced turbine engines are started on board, they can have a large efficiency advantage, with less corrosion or ash formation, by burning the fuel of the present invention during navigation. Moreover, depending on the available fuel economy of the port, the ship can obtain efficiency advantages by submitting these new fuels in the port to generate electricity and send this electricity to the local grid to obtain benefits. This benefit from the power generation in the port offsets the marine fuel cost and can reduce the actual total amount of the marine fuel cost of the ship to less than high sulfur fuel oil, thereby offsetting the cost of using the low sulfur fuel of the present invention, if this is a more expensive navigation fuel. The ultimate gain is for the environment, when compared under certain basic conditions, it is possible to achieve a reduction of more than ninety-five percent (95%) of SOx and NOx emissions, and it is possible to reduce the emission of 99% (almost 100%) of harmful metals during navigation. In addition, the environment can benefit from reduced CO2 emissions through (i) the efficiency of advanced gas turbine engines on ships and (ii) the efficiency of power generation in ports, where inefficiently burning fuels such as coal, crude oil, residual oil or some other fuel are replaced.

[0109] It is therefore apparent that the present invention has broad application in the production of fuels having reduced, low levels of sulfur and other pollutants and in the use of such fuels. Certain features may be modified without departing from the spirit or scope of the present invention. Thus, the present invention should not be construed as limited to the specific embodiments or examples discussed, but only as defined in the appended claims or the substantial equivalents of the claims.

Claims

1. A process for converting crude oil containing sulfur and metals, characterized in that: The process separates such crude oil as feed into streams based on sulfur content, treats one or more liquid portions of these separated streams to remove sulfur while leaving other portions untreated, and then recombine a majority volume of all the treated and untreated liquid streams as a combination (600) to form a liquid fuel having an actual sulfur content equal to or less than a target sulfur content, the process comprising (a) separating the crude oil (2) by one or more distillation steps (100, 200) into fractions comprising: (a)(1) a liquid fraction (10) at or below a sulfur breakpoint where the sulfur content increases rapidly or exponentially from level or near level with a high rate of increase per unit of run, where the increment of run is the change in unit volume of the fraction and the increment of rise is the change in units of sulfur content, and the slope is rise relative to run, and the slope of such rise relative to run starts from near zero or level and moves rapidly beyond 0.2 to rapidly beyond 1 to a sudden exponential increase in sulfur content; as well as (a)(2) a liquid fraction above the sulfur breakpoint, comprising one or more distillate streams (24, 26, 28, 32) and comprising one or more heavy oil streams (36, 38) and a distillation (200) residue (50) comprising a metal-containing fraction; (b) feeding the residue (50) to a solvent separation (300) step to remove the metal-rich residual oil (90) that is insoluble in the one or more solvents used in the solvent separation and to produce a deasphalted oil (80) that is soluble in the one or more solvents used in the solvent separation; (c) treating the above sulfur breakpoint liquid fraction (20) comprising one or more distillate streams (24, 26, 28, 32) and the above sulfur breakpoint liquid fraction (40) comprising one or more heavy oil streams (36, 38) and said soluble deasphalted oil (80) by one or more hydroprocessing steps to form one or more hydroprocessed streams (60, 70) having a reduced sulfur content, and (d) combining the hydrotreated stream (60, 70) with the liquid fraction (10) at or below the sulfur breakpoint of (a)(1) to form the fuel (600).

2. The process of claim 1, wherein at least one of the hydrotreated streams is an ultra low sulfur stream having 10 ppmwt or less sulfur, for adjusting the formation of the fuel by reducing or adding the amount of such stream to the combination to control the actual sulfur content to be at or below the sulfur breakpoint as the target sulfur content.

3. A process according to claim 1 having only four major unit operations: one or more of atmospheric and vacuum distillation, solvent separation and hydrotreatment, and no hydrocarbon treatment operations downstream of the hydrotreatment, except for the auxiliary units required for burning the residual oil, said auxiliary units being used to produce hydrogen and process facilities, for removing metals, and the sulfur and all gases including sulfur being directed to one or more common sulfur recovery units.

4. The process according to claim 1, wherein: The fuel combination (600) formed has a lowest boiling point portion that is a liquid fraction (10) with a lowest boiling point at or below the 1(a)(1) sulfur breakpoint that has not been treated in one or more hydroprocessing steps, and a highest boiling point portion of the fuel combination that is a liquid fraction (80) above the 1(a)(2) sulfur breakpoint that is soluble in the one or more solvents used in the solvent separation and has been treated in one or more hydroprocessing steps.

5. The process according to claim 1, wherein: The residual oil is combusted in one or more gasifiers to generate electricity and at least a portion of the hydrogen for the hydroprocessing, and gasifier solids, including at least a portion of the metals, are removed.

6. The process according to claim 1, wherein: The residual oil is burned in one or more boilers to generate electricity and is used in an auxiliary hydrogen generation unit operation to supply hydrogen for the hydroprocessing.

7. The process according to claim 1, wherein: A majority of the crude oil feed is substantially converted to a liquid fuel product, wherein at least one of the hydrotreated streams is an ultra-low sulfur stream having less than 10 ppmwt of sulfur, and at least one untreated fraction has a sulfur content exceeding a breakpoint and is used as a control adjustment amount, by reducing or adding such untreated fraction to the amount of the combination to adjust the sulfur content of the combination (600) to form a fuel having an actual sulfur content equal to or less than a target sulfur content.

8. The process according to claim 1, wherein: The crude oil feed is substantially converted to a liquid fuel product, wherein at least one of the separated streams is a first hydrotreated reduced sulfur stream having a sulfur content of less than 10 ppmwt sulfur, and at least one of the separated streams is a second hydrotreated reduced sulfur stream having a sulfur content in the range of 0.12 to 0.18 wt.% sulfur, and the liquid fraction (10) at or below the (a)(1) breakpoint is an untreated fraction having a sulfur content greater than, equal to, or less than a target sulfur content, and the first hydrotreated stream or the second hydrotreated stream or both are used as control adjustments to adjust the sulfur content of the combination (600) by reducing or adding amounts of these streams to the combination to form a fuel having an actual sulfur content equal to or less than the target sulfur content.

9. The process according to claim 1, wherein: At least 70% by volume per barrel of the crude oil feed is converted to form a combination of liquid fuel products (600) that when subsequently processed or unprocessed but combined, forms a liquid fuel product rather than a plurality of hydrocarbon products.

10. The process according to claim 1, wherein: The actual sulfur content of the fuel is adjusted to meet the IMO specification for marine fuel as a target sulfur content.

11. The process according to claim 1, wherein: High sulfur fuel oil is added to one or more feeds or fed separately to one or more of the distillation step, solvent separation step or hydroprocessing step.

12. A process according to claim 1 for producing fuel by combining untreated light tight oil or condensate, or a combination of untreated light tight oil or condensate, without treatment by one or more hydroprocessing steps, or with treatment by one or more hydroprocessing steps, wherein the light tight oil has a sulfur content in the range of 0.1 wt.% to 0.2 wt.%, and a density API (Deg) in the range of 38 to 57, and a distillation cut range in the range of (a) 5 to 20 wt.% of liquefied petroleum gas, in weight percentage by mass, (b) 10 to 35 wt.% naphtha, (c) 15 to 30 wt.% kerosene, (d) 15 to 25 wt.% diesel, (e) vacuum gas oil and (f) zero (0%) to 10% heavy residue.

13. A fuel produced by the process of claim 1, characterized in that it comprises (a) at least one liquid fraction above the sulfur breakpoint, said fraction being hydrotreated after removal of a metal-rich residual oil insoluble in one or more solvents used for solvent separation of said fraction, and (b) an untreated liquid fraction at or below the sulfur breakpoint.

14. Combustion of a fuel produced by the process of claim 1 in a marine or land-based engine, a combustion gas turbine or a combustion heater, said fuel being characterized by comprising (a) at least one liquid fraction above the sulfur breakpoint, said fraction being hydrotreated after removal of a metal-rich residue insoluble in one or more solvents used for solvent separation of said fraction, and (b) an untreated liquid fraction at or below the sulfur breakpoint.

15. A process for integrating atmospheric and vacuum distillation, solvent separation and hydroprocessing to produce fuel components, characterized in that This integration of processes separates a feed into streams, treats one or more portions of these separated streams, and then recombines the treated and untreated streams to form a fuel having an initial boiling point that is the lowest boiling point of any fraction in the combined untreated streams in the fuel and a highest boiling point that is the highest boiling point portion of an effluent from solvent separation that is subsequently treated and forms a portion of the fuel, the fuel having an actual sulfur content at or below a target sulfur content limit level, the process comprising (a) feeding crude oil (2) including sulfur and metal contaminants to an atmospheric distillation column (100) and separating the feed into a light overhead gas (4) and a plurality of cuts, including: (i) unstable wild straight run naphtha (16), wherein (x) "unstable naphtha" means naphtha from which C4 or lighter components have not been removed; for illustration, in a conventional refinery, the feed stream to the naphtha debutanizer is an unstable naphtha, and (y) "unstable wild straight run naphtha" means a carbonaceous composition recovered from atmospheric distillation ranging from at least three (3) carbon C3, such as propane, to a carbonaceous composition having an initial boiling point (IBP) of about 175°C (about 350°F), without lower boiling compounds. (z) "wild naphtha", in the context of hydroprocessing, means the unstable light fraction of the hydrotreater effluent recovered from a fractionator or other separator, the operability of which is considered to be part of the hydroprocessing zone, and one or more heavier fractions are recovered at or near the bottom of the separator, such as the distillate range, the heavy oil range, or other range that is heavier and more unstable than the naphtha portion of the separator feed, (ii) a sulfur breakpoint cut (18) into hydrocarbon-containing liquids (10) having a boiling point above the end boiling point of the naphtha range of (a)(i) but below or at a sulfur breakpoint at which the sulfur content increases rapidly or exponentially from level or near level with respect to a high rate of increase per unit run, wherein the increment of run is the change in unit volume of the fraction and the increment of rise is the change in units of sulfur content, and the slope is the rise relative to the run, and such slope of rise relative to the run starts from near zero or level and moves rapidly beyond 0.2 to rapidly beyond 1 to a sudden exponential increase in sulfur content, (iii) the light distillate above the breakpoint cut of (24) (a)(ii)(18), wherein "light distillate above the breakpoint cut" or "light distillate" means a fraction having an initial sulfur content exceeding the highest sulfur content of the breakpoint cut, which in turn has an initial boiling point (IBP) exceeding the highest final boiling point of the breakpoint cut, (iv) a middle distillate (26), wherein "middle distillate" refers to a fraction between light distillates and heavy distillates separated by a cut based on a preferred distillation column design; wherein The middle distillate cut can be eliminated and combined with the light or heavy distillates, (v) a first heavy distillate (28), wherein "first heavy distillate" refers to the heaviest fraction of the atmospheric distillation unit, the sulfur content and boiling point range of which is determined by operating factors, such as one or more of the sulfur composition of the feed to the distillation unit, the severity of the crude column operation, and downstream hydroprocessing conditions, (vi) atmospheric residue (30), (b) feeding the atmospheric residue oil (30) of (a)(vi) to a vacuum distillation column (200) to produce (i) a second heavy distillate (32), wherein the second heavy distillate refers to the lightest fraction of the vacuum distillation column, having a sulfur content and boiling point range determined by reference to the sulfur composition and sulfur cutoff of the distillation unit feed and by reference to one or more operating factors such as the severity of the crude column operation and the severity of the downstream distillate hydroprocessing conditions, (ii) Light Vacuum Gas Oil (36) (iii) Heavy vacuum gas oil (38) (iv) Vacuum residue (50) (c) feeding the vacuum residue (50) from (b) (iv) to a solvent separation (300) to produce (i) deasphalted oil (80) and (ii) metal-rich bitumen (90), (d) feeding (a)(iii) the light distillate (24), (a)(iv) the middle distillate (26), (a)(v) the first heavy distillate (28), and (b)(i) the second heavy distillate (32) to a distillate hydrotreater (430) under hydrotreating conditions in the presence of a catalyst and adding hydrogen to form a stream (60) comprising, (i) wild naphtha, wherein "wild naphtha" in the context of hydroprocessing means the unstable lighter fraction of the hydrotreater effluent recovered from a fractionator or other separator, operable to be considered as part of a hydroprocessing zone, with one or more heavier fractions recovered at or near the bottom of the separator, such as a distillate range, a heavy oil range, or other range that is heavier and more unstable than the naphtha portion of the separator feed, (ii) ultra low sulfur diesel, a reduced sulfur stream formed from a combination of treated distillate streams (60) comprising (a)(iii) a light distillate (24), (a)(iv) a middle distillate (26), (a)(v) a first heavy distillate (28), and (b)(i) a second heavy distillate (32), and associated by-products (420), including (iii) Sour gas streams, including hydrogen sulfide (iv) a hydrogen-rich waste gas, at least a portion of which is treated to remove sulfur and recycled as hydrogen addition (502) to the distillate hydrotreater (430) of (d) or the heavy oil hydrotreater (460) of (e) (e) feeding (b)(ii) light vacuum gas oil (36), (b)(iii) heavy vacuum gas oil (38) and (c)(i) deasphalted oil (80) to a heavy oil hydrotreater (460) under hydrotreating conditions in the presence of a catalyst and adding hydrogen to form a stream (70) comprising (i) wild naphtha, wherein "wild naphtha" in the context of hydroprocessing means the unstable lighter fraction of the hydrotreater effluent recovered from a fractionator or other separator, operable to be considered as part of a hydroprocessing zone, with one or more heavier fractions recovered at or near the bottom of the separator, such as a distillate range, a heavy oil range, or other range that is heavier and more unstable than the naphtha portion of the separator feed, (ii) ultra low sulfur diesel, a first reduced sulfur stream formed from a first portion of the combination of the treated distillate vapors, comprising (b)(ii) light vacuum gas oil (36), (b)(iii) heavy vacuum gas oil (38) and (c)(i) deasphalted oil (80) (iii) a second reduced sulfur stream (70) formed from a second portion of the combination of the treated distillate stream (40) comprising (b)(ii) light vacuum gas oil (36), (b)(iii) heavy vacuum gas oil (38), and (c)(i) deasphalted oil (80), together with associated by-products (420), including (iv) Sour gas streams, including hydrogen sulfide (v) a hydrogen-rich waste gas, at least a portion of which is treated to remove sulfur and recycled as hydrogen addition (502) to the distillate hydrotreater (430) of (d) or the heavy oil hydrotreater (460) of (e), and (f) forming said fuel product having an actual sulfur content at or below the target sulfur content limit level by combining the following in such a way that the actual sulfur content of said fuel does not exceed the target sulfur content limit: (i) (a) (i) destabilized wild run naphtha (16) and (a) (i) sulfur cut (18) stream (10) without additional treatment, with (ii) a stream from a distillate hydrotreater (60) comprising all or part of (d)(i) wild naphtha and (d)(ii) ultra low sulfur diesel, and (iii) a stream from a heavy oil hydrotreater (70) comprising (e)(i) wild naphtha, (e)(ii) ultra low sulfur diesel, and (e)(iii) a second reduced sulfur stream.

16. A process according to claim 15, comprising integrating a gasification system by the steps of: (a) feeding the bitumen 15(c)(ii) as a heavy residue rich in metals to one or more gasification units comprising a gasifier for partial oxidation of the stream 15(c)(ii) in the presence of steam and oxygen to form (i) synthesis gas, at least a portion of which is converted into hydrogen for use in the distillate hydrotreater of 15(d) and the heavy oil hydrotreater of 15(e), and synthesis gas for use in a combustion gas turbine of a combined cycle power plant, further comprising a heat recovery generator to recover heat from the gas turbine gas to generate steam, said steam driving a steam turbine for power generation, and (ii) solid soot, containing a portion of the metal contaminants from the crude oil feed, which solids are directed from each gasifier to remove metals, and (b) directing all sour gas streams from said gasification and all unit operations of claim 15 to one or more gas recovery units for sulfur removal.

17. The process of claim 15, wherein: In actual products, sulfur levels are achieved by increasing or decreasing the amount of any one or more of the following in combination: (a) stream (a)(i) unstable wild run naphtha or (a)(ii) sulfur cut, said stream not being hydrotreated, (b) a stream flowing into or out of a distillate hydrotreater, or (c) a stream flowing into or out of a heavy oil hydrotreater, Wherein the adjustment is based on a measurement of the relative sulfur content of each stream to the combination to form a fuel product having an actual sulfur content at or below a target sulfur content limit level.

18. The process according to claim 15, achieved by (a) feeding said combination 15(a)(i) destabilized wild run naphtha and 15(a)(ii) sulfur break cut, each without added treatment, (b) Adjust the actual product sulfur level by adding or subtracting any one or more of the following to the combination: (i) a stream flowing into a distillate hydrotreater, (ii) a stream flowing into a heavy oil hydrotreater, and (c) Then, if for any reason it is necessary to increase the actual product sulfur level to the target sulfur level, then reduce the amount or severity of desulfurization by any one or more of the following to the combination described: (i) a stream exiting a distillate hydrotreater, (ii) Flow out of the heavy oil hydrotreater or (d) If for any reason it is necessary to reduce the actual product sulfur content to a level at or below the target sulfur limit level to form a fuel product having an actual sulfur content at or below the target sulfur limit level, then add any one or more of the following to the combination: (i) a stream exiting a distillate hydrotreater, (ii) The stream exiting the heavy oil hydrotreater.

19. The process of claim 15, wherein: The equipment used for the atmospheric distillation, vacuum distillation, solvent separation and hydroprocessing operations is sized to have an additive or backup capacity to process additional feeds including high sulfur oil or other heavy residual oils from various sources outside the cell limits of the operation to form a fuel with an actual sulfur content at or below the target sulfur content limit level and to capture at least a portion of the sulfur and metals from the additional heavy residual oil.

20. The process of claim 15, wherein: High sulfur fuel oil with a sulfur content greater than the target sulfur limit level is fed to one or more of the following (a) atmospheric pressure or vacuum distillation, (b) solvent separation, (c) a distillate hydrotreater, alone or in combination with one or more of 15(a)(iii) a light distillate, 15(a)(iv) a middle distillate, 15(a)(v) a first heavy distillate, and 15(b)(i) a second heavy distillate feed to said distillate hydrotreater, or (d) a heavy oil hydrotreater, alone or in combination with one or more of 15(b)(ii) light vacuum gas oil, 15(b)(iii) heavy vacuum gas oil, and 15(c)(i) deasphalted oil, to form a fuel having an actual sulfur content at or below the target sulfur limit level.

21. The process of claim 15, wherein: High sulfur fuel oil or other heavy residual oil from a supply source different from the vacuum distillation, solvent separation unit of claim 15 is fed to one or more of the following, said oil or residual oil having a sulfur content greater than the target sulfur content limit level (a) 15(b) a vacuum distillation column, alone or in combination with 15(a)(vi) atmospheric residue, to produce at least a portion of any one or all of said 15(b)(i) second heavy distillate, 15(b)(ii) light vacuum gas oil, 15(b)(iii) heavy vacuum gas oil, 15(b)(iv) vacuum residue, or (b) 15(c) solvent separation, alone or in combination with 15(b)(iv) vacuum residue, to produce 15(c)(i) deasphalted oil and 15(c)(ii) metal-rich bitumen, to form a fuel having an actual sulfur content at or below the target sulfur limit level.

22. The process of claim 15, wherein: High sulphur fuel oil with a sulphur content less than or greater than the target sulphur limit level in combination with one or more of the following: (a) a stream formed from 15(a)(i) destabilized wild run naphtha and 15(a)(ii) sulfur break cut, without added treatment, or (b) a stream formed from a distillate hydrotreater consisting of 15(d)(i) wild naphtha and 15(d)(ii) ultra low sulfur diesel, or (c) a stream formed from a heavy oil hydrotreater comprising 15(e)(i) wild naphtha, 15(e)(ii) ultra low sulfur diesel and 15(e)(iii) a second reduced sulfur stream, to form a portion of the fuel having an actual sulfur content at or below the target sulfur content limit level.

23. The process of claim 15, wherein: The light tight oil is combined with one or more of the following (a) a feed to an atmospheric or vacuum distillation, solvent separation, distillate hydrotreater or heavy oil hydrotreater, (b) a stream formed from unstable wild run naphtha from 15(a)(i) and sulfur cut from 15(a)(ii), without added treatment, or (c) a stream formed from a distillate hydrotreater consisting of 15(d)(i) wild naphtha and 15(d)(ii) ultra low sulfur diesel, or (d) a stream formed from a heavy oil hydrotreater comprising 15(e)(i) wild naphtha, 15(e)(ii) ultra low sulfur diesel, and 15(e)(iii) a second reduced sulfur stream, or (e) a single effluent stream formed by the combination of all of the hydroprocessed effluent from the distillate hydrotreater 15(d) and all of the hydroprocessed effluent from the heavy oil hydrotreater 15(e), to form a fuel having an actual sulfur content at or below the target sulfur limit level.

24. The process of claim 15, wherein: The process for removing sulfur from a sour gas stream is by more than one amine or other removal agent and solvent in one or more removal units, wherein the ratio of each removal agent in each unit is adjusted based on the sulfur profile of each unit to selectively remove fewer or more complex sulfur-containing molecules.

25. The process of claim 15, wherein: The stream (60) from the distillate hydrotreater and the stream (70) from the heavy oil hydrotreater are each directed to a separator which keeps the liquids separate but forms a common overhead gas, and each liquid is removed separately for subsequent combination in a fuel product, as part of such combination as a trim for composition control or other uses.

26. A fuel produced by the process of claim 15, said fuel being characterized by having an initial boiling point which is the lowest boiling point of any fraction in the untreated stream combined in said fuel, and a highest boiling point which is the highest boiling point portion of the effluent from solvent separation which is subsequently treated and forms part of said fuel, said fuel comprising (a) Untreated naphtha (b) untreated fractions boiling above the end of the naphtha range but at or below the sulfur cutoff, (c) hydrotreated diesel, and (d) Hydrotreated soluble effluent from solvent separation of heavy oil.

27. A method (a) for the reduction of emissions in excess of IMO regulations from a ship at sea or in an ECAs or in port, by using at sea, in an ECAs or in port a fuel having a sulphur content adjusted to less than the maximum applicable IMO regulation at the location where the ship is using the fuel, or (b) used to meet one or more target IMO specifications for marine fuels, The fuel is formed by adjusting the amount of the continuous flow to the combined untreated and treated streams.

28. A process for reducing emissions in excess of IMO regulations for marine vessels by burning at sea a fuel produced according to claim 15, said fuel being characterised by having an initial boiling point which is the lowest boiling point of any fraction in the untreated stream combined in said fuel and a highest boiling point which is the highest boiling point portion of the effluent from solvent separation of heavy oil which is subsequently treated and forms part of said fuel, said fuel comprising (a) Untreated naphtha (b) untreated fractions having a boiling point above the end of the naphtha range but at or below the sulfur cutoff, (c) hydrotreated diesel, and (d) a soluble effluent from solvent separation of hydrotreated heavy fuel oil, said fuel having a sulphur content adjusted to below the maximum value of applicable IMO regulations, wherein at the location where said fuel is combusted in said vessel, the sulphur content of the fuel is reduced to below said maximum value by adding hydrotreated diesel or a soluble effluent of hydrotreated heavy fuel oil above the sulphur breakpoint, or by adding at least one untreated fraction having a sulphur content below or at the sulphur breakpoint, but not exceeding or equal to said maximum value.

Images