RESEARCHERS at Curtin University of Technology have assisted the Kwinana BP oil refinery to better understand flow distribution issues through the development of computational fluid dynamics.

The BP and Australian Research Council-funded project into advanced computer modelling systems was led by Curtin’s Centre of Process Systems Computations Co-Director, Professor Vishnu Pareek, over a period of three years.

Advanced computer modelling systems from Curtin University are helping with flow distribution issues at the Kwinana BP refinery / Image: Istockphoto

The project, aimed at improving the refinery’s performance, was led by Prof Pareek and his team alongside the University of Newcastle’s Professor Geoffrey Evans and BP Global FCC advisor Michael Glenny.

Prof Pareek says refineries traditionally use rule of thumb to address any hydrodynamic issues, which results in uncertainty when faced with unfamiliar situations.

“When crude oil is extracted from oil-fields, it is a thick mixture of many hydrocarbons compounds.

“In a refinery, the crude oil is first sent to a massive distillation column, typically 4 m in diameter and 40 m high, where these hydrocarbons are separated in a number of products.”

Prof Pareek says the products resulting from hydrocarbon separation include LPG, naptha (which is used in dry cleaning and feedstock for other petrochemicals),gasoline, kerosene, diesel fuel oil, and residue, or heavy gas, oil.

“The bottom-most product is not useful, so it is sent to another unit in the refinery called the Fluid Catalytic Cracker (FCC), which converts this heavy, thick and almost useless stuff to useful products such as petrol.

“A catalyst stripper is a part of the FCC unit and is used to strip off the oil and other products from the surface of the catalyst used in FCC.

“FCC Stripper operation is of critical importance because any un-stripped hydrocarbon not only depletes productivity but also contributes to greenhouse gases when it is burnt to regenerate the catalyst.”

According to Prof Pareek, computational fluid dynamics has helped to resolve these issues by reporting on the mechanism of the catalyst and steam, which is used to strip hydrocarbons off the catalyst surface, and their flow inside the stripper.

“Our research has helped BP to make a key decision regarding a design change in their stripper system.

“BP is now considering implementing this across their other refineries.”

Prof Pareek says the technology will be useful to all unit operations in industry and he looks forward to beginning the second phase of the BP project.

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