A Novel Approach to Determine the Enriched Gas Recycling during the Enriched Gas Flooding Process

A novel approach was proposed for calculating the enriched gas recovery factor based on the theory of two-phase isothermal flash calculations. First, define a new parameter, pseudo formation volume factor of enriched gas, to represent the ratio of the surface volume of produced mixture gas to underground volume of enriched gas. Two logarithmic functions were obtained by matching the flash calculation data, to characterize the relationships between pseudo formation volume factor and the produced gas-oil ratio. These two functions belong to the proportion of liquefied petroleum gas in enriched gas; the proportion is greater than 50% and less than 50%, respectively. Given measured gas-oil ratio and produced gas volume, underground volume of produced enriched gas can be calculated. Injection volume of enriched gas is known; therefore, recovery factor of enriched gas is the ratio of produced to injected volume of enriched gas. This approach is simply to calculate enriched gas recovery factor, because of only needs three parameters, which can be measured directly. New approach was compared to numerical simulation results; mean error is 12%. In addition, new approach can effectively avoid the influence of lean gas on the calculation of enriched gas recycling. Three stages of enriched gas recovery factors in field Z were calculated, and the mean error is 5.62% compared to the field analysis, which proves that the new approach’s correctness and practicability.

Phonolite Material as Catalyst Support for the Hydrotreatment of Gas Oil and Vegetable Oil Type Feedstocks

Phonolite material has shown to be promising catalyst support for the deoxygenation of triglycerides. In this work, we continue with our previous research by synthesising and testing three acid-treated phonolite-supported Co-Mo, Ni-Mo and Ni-W catalysts for the hydrotreating of atmospheric gas oil and co-processing with rapeseed oil at industrial operating conditions (350–370 °C, WHSV 1–2 h−1, 5.5 MPa) in the continuous regime for more than 270 h. The phonolite-supported catalysts showed hydrotreating activity comparable with commercial catalysts, together with a complete conversion of triglycerides into n-alkanes. During co-processing, the Ni-promoted catalyst showed strong stability, with similar activity previous to the rapeseed oil addition. Our results enable us to evaluate the suitability of phonolite as catalyst support for the development of plausible alternatives to conventional hydrotreating catalysts for the co-processing of middle distillates with vegetable oils.

Synthesis and Characterization of New nano catalyst Mo-Ni /TiO2- γAl2O3 for Hydrodesulphurization of Iraqi Gas Oil

A new nano-sized NiMo/TiO2-γ-Al2O3 was prepared as a Hydrodesulphurization catalyst for Iraqi gas oil with sulfur content of 8980 ppm, supplied from Al-Dura Refinery. Sol-gel method was used to prepare TiO2- γ-Al2O3 nano catalyst support with 64% TiO2, 32% Al2O3, Ni-Mo/TiO-γ-Al2O3 catalyst was prepared under vacuum impregnation conditions to loading metals with percentage 3.8 wt.% and 14 wt.% for nickel and molybdenum respectively while the percentage for alumina, and titanium became 21.7, and 58.61 respectively. The synthesized TiO2- γ-Al2O3 nanocomposites and Ni-Mo /TiO2- γ-Al2O3 Nano catalyst were then characterized by XRD, AFM, and BET surface area, SEM, XRF, and FTIR. The performance of the synthesized catalyst for removing sulfur compounds was conducted through the pilot HDS laboratory unit, various temperatures range 275oC to 375°C, LHSV 1 h-1 were studied; moreover, the effect of LHSV 1 to 4 h-1 on the percentage of sulfur removal was also studied at the temperature of the best removal with constant pressure 35 bar and H2/HC ratio 200cm3/200cm3. The sulfur content results generally revealed that there was a substantial decrease at all operating conditions used, while the maximum sulfur removal was 87.75% in gas oil on Ni-Mo/TiO2-γ-Al2O3 catalyst at temperature 375˚C and LHSV 1h-1.

Cleaner Fuel Production via Co-Processing of Vacuum Gas Oil with Rapeseed Oil Using a Novel NiW/Acid-Modified Phonolite Catalyst

Clean biofuels are a helpful tool to comply with strict emission standards. The co-processing approach seems to be a compromise solution, allowing the processing of partially bio-based feedstock by utilizing existing units, overcoming the need for high investment in new infrastructures. We performed a model co-processing experiment using vacuum gas oil (VGO) mixed with different contents (0%, 30%, 50%, 70%, 90%, and 100%) of rapeseed oil (RSO), utilizing a nickel–tungsten sulfide catalyst supported on acid-modified phonolite. The experiments were performed using a fixed-bed flow reactor at 420 °C, a hydrogen pressure of 18 MPa, and a weight hourly space velocity (WHSV) of 3 h−1. Surprisingly, the catalyst stayed active despite rising oxygen levels in the feedstock. In the liquid products, the raw diesel (180–360 °C) and jet fuel (120–290 °C) fraction concentrations increased together with increasing RSO share in the feedstock. The sulfur content was lower than 200 ppm for all the products collected using feedstocks with an RSO share of up to 50%. However, for all the products gained from the feedstock with an RSO share of ≥50%, the sulfur level was above the threshold of 200 ppm. The catalyst shifted its functionality from hydrodesulfurization to (hydro)decarboxylation when there was a higher ratio of RSO than VGO content in the feedstock, which seems to be confirmed by gas analysis where increased CO2 content was found after the change to feedstocks containing 50% or more RSO. According to the results, NiW/acid-modified phonolite is a suitable catalyst for the processing of feedstocks with high triglyceride content.