Oxy fuel combustion in process heaters of oil refinery

[waqar_saeed88@yahoo.com]

Why don’t we use pure Oxygen in the furnaces? If pure oxygen is so much helpful in the burning process then why we do not use it? As it is an environmental issue not only hydrotreating heaters but also other refinery heaters.
We should manage the cost of nitrogen and oxygen separation plants from the air for a friendly environment it can save lives up to many years. Am I right?

[Usman Rasheed]

Oxy-fuel combustion is the process of burning fuel using pure oxygen instead of air as the primary oxidant. Since the nitrogen component of air is not heated, fuel consumption is reduced, and higher flame temperatures are possible. Historically, the primary use of oxy-fuel combustion has been in the welding and cutting of metal.
Advantages:
1. The mass and volume of the flue gas are reduced by approximately 75%.
2. less heat is lost in the flue gas.
3. The size of the flue gas treatment equipment can be reduced by 75%.
4. The flue gas is primarily CO2, suitable for sequestration.
5. Low nitrogen oxide/NOXes production.
Challenges are high installation and operating costs. Installed at small-scale power plants still needs to be adopted by oil refineries. Linde Engineering has several references.
Simple process of Oxy-fuel combustion is shown by Linde.
For further details you can also visit the link.

[nasir410]

Definitely, there are so many advantages of pure oxygen use in furnaces but it’s industrial scale installations are still not common.
If this technology has become cheap and common and it has been integrated with current refineries then it would be possible to adopt this process.
Also, refineries should take this opportunity to save the environment and earn the profit.

[Usman Rasheed]

Oxy-fuel combustion is the process of burning fuel using pure oxygen instead of air. Since the nitrogen component of air is not heated, fuel consumption is reduced, and higher flame temperatures are possible. Historically, the primary use of oxy-fuel combustion has been in welding and cutting of metals.
Advantages:
1. The mass and volume of the flue gas are reduced by approximately 75%.
2. Less heat is lost in the flue gas.
3. The size of the flue gas treatment equipment can be reduced by 75%.
4. The flue gas is primarily CO2, suitable for sequestration.
5. The concentration of pollutants in the flue gas is higher, making separation easier.
6. Most of the flue gases are condensable; this makes compression separation possible.
Low NOX production.
Challenges:
High installation and operating costs. Not mature technology. Lots of work on lab scale and small power plants but on large scale still needs work.
For general information please visit.
Linde Engineering shows several references
The simple Oxy-fuel combustion process by Linde can be seen on the link.

[Author]

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