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• Is there any dependence on the temperature of diesel fuel for separating water when supplying it to the park for storage. That is, for example, when separating fuel and water, for example in an electric dehydrator, how does the temperature of the incoming diesel fuel affect it?

  Nov-2024

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Answers

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• Ildar Batkayev, JSC PKOP, ibatkaev@gmail.com

  Good day, Mr. Marcio! Thank you very much for your detailed answer! Indeed, the task is not easy, since there are supporters of leaving everything as it is and not changing or improving anything.

  Nov-2024

• Marcio Wagner da Silva, Petrobras, marciows@petrobras.com.br

  Unfortunately, the water removal in final and intermediate streams is common concern in the operation in stockpiling assets of crude oil refineries once the processing units normally do not reach a perfect water separation in the top vessels of fractionating columns like atmospheric crude oil distillation, for example leaving to the straight run naphtha to drag some amount of free water. Furthermore, there is the equilibrium water content in the hydrocarbons which do not have adequate residence time to reach the separation from the hydrocarbons in the processing units. Under this context it's fundamental to the stockpiling operation to keep a routine to drain the tanks bottom to remove water, avoiding the accumulation and consequently the degradation of tanks bottom by sulphate reduction bacteria's which can lead a serious problems to the storage tank and to the processing units (degraded products can fouling the heat exchangers of the processing units and cause corrosion issues). Regarding the question, based on the Stokes law, raising the temperature tends to improve the performance of the settling process once it will reduce the viscosity of the hydrocarbon phase. Despite this it's important to consider that, in an electrostatic separator, an increase in the temperature will lead to an increase to power consumption once the conductivity of the oil phase will rise. It's necessary to reach an adequate balance between these two variables.

  Nov-2024