Is Crude Oil A Petroleum Product? – Transformation of complex mixtures into useful products Date updated: 2018-06-01 Petroleum and the Environment, Part 16/24 Written by E. Allison and B. Mandler for AGI, 2018 Download print version Introduction Crude oil and natural gas are complex mixtures. generally not suitable for direct use. Oil refining and gas processing convert these mixtures into a variety of fuels and other products, while removing low-value and polluting elements. Refining and processing has positive and negative environmental impacts: although they remove harmful pollutants and make burning fuels cleaner, operations at refineries and processing plants can emit pollutants that harm the environment and affect local air and water quality. During crude oil distillation, different types of fuel are condensed and processed at different temperatures. Image credit: Wikimedia Commons Users Psarianos and Teresa Knott.1 Refined crude oil is a mixture of many hydrocarbon molecules of different sizes. Smaller molecules help at lower temperatures, so the crude oil can be distilled to separate the various hydrocarbons. During the distillation process, the crude oil evaporates and the hot steam rises up the column and cools it. Different hydrocarbons react at different temperatures and therefore condense in liquid form at different points in the column, separating the crude oil into different components which then need to be further processed to optimize the final use. Gasoline and diesel are the most useful products derived from crude oil, so they use refining methods to increase the production of this fuel. This can include cracking (breaking larger molecules into smaller molecules 2 ), hydrotreating (replacing impurities such as sulfur with hydrogen to improve fuel quality), reforming (turning smaller molecules into gasoline 2 ), alkylation (using an acid to produce high octane gasoline from smaller molecules 4 ) and blending (mixing different liquids together to produce uniform products that meet regulatory standards). At the blending stage, ethanol from industrial ethanol plants is also blended into gasoline to increase its octane content, reduce carbon monoxide emissions, and meet the requirements of the Renewable Fuel Standard. 6 Products of oil refining Crude oils have different compositions, which contain different blends. . of varying amounts of hydrocarbon and sulfur and other impurities. The percentage of different refined products varies with changes in the types of refined oil, for different products, and the regulations that require it. About 80-85% of crude oil ends up as gasoline, diesel or jet fuel. The rest was used for gas 1.6 million barrels of jet fuel.8 Oil refineries (open fields) and gas processing facilities (blue) in the United States as of February 2018. Not shown: two refineries in Hawaii and five in Alaska. Image Credit: US Energy Information Administration 17 Natural Gas Production In 2017, the United States produced 33 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. ; the rest is processed by DL gas processing plants to produce 27 trillion cubic meters of pipeline-grade natural gas 10, 11 Pipeline-grade gas must meet rigid standards for industrial content and purity 12 for residential, commercial and industrial use, including natural gas. gas power plant. Processed natural gas consists mainly of methane, with varying proportions of hydrocarbons, carbon dioxide (CO2), sulfur dioxide, nitrogen, water vapor and helium. Improve combustion and reduce corrosion, water by removing the formation of harmful acids, by removing harmful or corrosive gases – especially sulfur and CO2 – which can otherwise react with small amounts of water, so that the acids seal the energy of the gas to ensure uniform combustion in furnaces and other equipment, mainly by removing non-flammable gases such as -CO2 and extraction of lower value nitrogen gas for other uses (for example, other hydrocarbons and helium) hydrocarbons not methane in the gas processing process collectively known as . “Natural Gas Liquids” (NGL) many liquids readily rate at high pressure or cold. The most common NGLs are ethane, propane and butane. Ethane and propane are further processed in large quantities to make raw materials for plastics (see “Non-fuel Oil and Gas Products” in this series), while propane and butane are compressed into liquids to provide a dense energy source for fuels that there is no fuel. -net uses The main ways to use the methane component of non-extractable natural gas are to absorb it and cool it. A variety of absorbents can be used, notably oils (for NGLs), glycols (for water), amines (for sulfur and CO214), and zeolites or oil absorption (for nitrogen15). Natural gas cooling at different temperatures allows different elements to be removed as they condense into liquids. This is the most common method of nitrogen removal: the natural gas is cooled until it liquefies the methane and allows the nitrogen gas to evaporate. bending.18 After processing, the gas is considered “dry” and ready to be sent via pipelines to end users. Refining, processing and the environment Refining and processing reduce the environmental impact of fuel from oil and gas by removing harmful pollutants and increasing their reliability during combustion. However, refineries and factory processes have their own environmental impacts, with corresponding processes to minimize those impacts. More on this can be found in other parts of this series: “Mitigation and Control of Methane Emissions” and “Air Quality Impacts of Oil and Gas.” Carbon dioxide (CO2) occurs in various proportions in natural gas and is removed in processing plants to improve the quality of the gas. Most of these carbon dioxide emissions are released into the atmosphere, accounting for about 0.4% of total US greenhouse gas emissions (in comparison, methane emissions from the natural gas production and distribution chain are estimated to be about 3% of US emissions). A small number of gas processing plants have captured the CO2 removed from natural gas in the process; this captured CO2 is injected into oil fields to recover better oil.20 References 1 File: Crude Oil Distillation-en. Wikimedia Commons uses Psarians & Theresa Knott. Copied under CC BY-SA 3.0 license. 2 Center for Industry Education Collaboration, University of York (2014). Smelting and related processes. The chemical industry – online. » Kokayeff, P. et al. (2014). Water treatment in oil production. In: Arbor, S., Jones, D., Pujado, P. (Eds.). Handbook of oil extraction. Springer, Cham. 4 US Energy Information Administration (2013). Alkylation is an important source of octane in gasoline. Energy Today, 13 February 2013. 5 US Environmental Protection Agency – Gasoline Standards: Reid Vapor Pressure of Gasoline. 6 US Energy Information Administration – Biofuels: Ethanol and Biodiesel Explained – Ethanol Use. 7 US Energy Information Administration – Oil: Analysis of Crude Oil and Crude Oil Products – Crude Oil Refining. 8 US Energy Information Administration – Petroleum and Liquids: US Product Supply, Total Crude and Oil. 9 US Energy Information Administration – US Gross Natural Gas Production. 10 US Energy Information Administration – Annual Natural Gas Questionnaire Response System, EIA-757: Natural Gas Processing Capacity by Plant, Data Through 2014. 12 13 Penn State College of Earth and Mineral Sciences, e-Education Institute – Petroleum Processing: Natural Gas Composition and Specifications. 14 Rufford, T.E. and more. (2012). Removal of CO2 and N2 from Natural Gas: A Review of Conventional Processes and New Technologies. J. Pet. Veit Eng., 94-95, 123-154. 15 Sep-Pro Systems – Nitrogen Recovery Units. 16 US Energy Information Administration (2006). Natural gas production: An important link between the production of natural gas and its transport to the market. 17 US Energy Information Administration – US Energy Map System. 18 US Department of Energy (2017). Primary liquefied natural gas, focusing on the Appalachian region. 19 US Environmental Protection Agency (2017). United States Greenhouse Gas Emissions and Reductions Inventory: 1990-2015. 20 Global CCS Institute – Project Database: Large-Scale CCS Facilities. Petroleum and the Environment Download PDF Petroleum and the Environment (free) or buy in print ($19.99). Other parts in this series: 1. Petroleum and the Environment: An Introduction 2. Water in the Oil and Gas Industry 3. Seismic Activity from Oil and Gas Operations 4. Hydraulic Fracturing Wells 5. Use of Produced Water 6. Groundwater Conservation. in oil and gas production 7. Abandoned wells 8. What determines the location of a well? 9. Land Use in the Oil and Gas Industry 10. Pinedale Gas Field, Wyoming 11. Heavy Oil 12. Oil and Gas in the US Arctic 13. Offshore Oil and Gas 14. Distribution of Oil and Natural Gas Fields 15. Transportation of. Oil, gas and refined products 16. Oil refining and production processing 17. Non-fuel oil and gas products 18. Air quality effects of oil and gas 19. Methane
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