December 2015

Sinopec Shanghai Petrochemical Co. Ltd. (SSPC) has been closely working with the East China University of Science and Technology (ECUST) on technical research to improve operational efficiency, reduce energy consumption and increase ethylene production.

With the greater processing of heavy crude oils in refineries, the importance of fluid catalytic cracking units (FCCUs) has increased.

The global hydrocarbon processing industry continues to expand and modernize to efficiently meet growing demand for energy, transportation fuels and petrochemicals.

In part, the combustion of hydrocarbon fuels is responsible for significant gains in both the quantity and quality of life, and we burn these fuels more cleanly now than at any time in history.

Heat exchanger tubes tend to vibrate when influenced by crossflow velocities.

A new methodology can be used to optimize the operations of an alkylation unit based on response surface methods.

A dividing-wall column (DWC) can provide significant savings in energy and capital cost compared to a conventional distillation column design.

When seeking a pump for a low-flow, high-head application, there is a temptation to choose a high-speed (HS) integral gear-driven centrifugal pump because of its advantages over multi-stage centrifugal and other types of pumps.

Compressor owner-operators now have unprecedented and solidly verifiable options.

The increasing costs of a wastewater treatment plant (WWTP) motivated a major specialty chemical plant to improve the performance of its treatment unit.

As we have seen over the past year and a half, low oil prices have spurred global consumption.

Many years ago, the vice president of a major steam turbine manufacturing company was called to give a legal deposition in Canada.

The need for more automated and efficient operations has led end users to accumulate large and increasingly complex collections of operations-related information technology (IT) solutions.

Russia plans to increase the volume of oil it refined this year, despite Western sanctions and the ever-deteriorating business environment, according to an official spokesperson for Alexander Novak, Russia’s minister of energy.

A year ago in this publication, John England and Ashnu Mittal were prescient in their article titled “US shale revolution set to spill over into downstream.”

As 2015 comes to a close, Hydrocarbon Processing is once again examining the most popular developments from the past year with regard to the global refining, petrochemical and LNG/gas processing industries.

Despite the delay or cancellation of some projects due to low oil prices, total active downstream project investments are near an all-time high.

Global refinery margins fell due to the expectations of a mild winter and an oversupply environment.

As 2015 comes to a close, new project numbers globally are down year-over-year.

The FM-approved FireChek thermal shutoff valve with resettable memory shape alloy can now be used to automatically shut down a pneumatic control system when a nearby fire occurs, or when the ambient temperature reaches 135°F, 150°F or 165°F.

Michael D. Scott has been named an International Society of Automation (ISA) Fellow, a distinguished grade that is granted to ISA senior members in recognition of outstanding achievements in scientific or engineering fields.