Environment & Safety Gas Processing/LNG Maintenance & Reliability Petrochemicals Process Control Process Optimization Project Management Refining

Maintenance & Reliability

Mitigate fouling in crude unit overhead—Part 2

CH2M Hill: Sloley, A. W.

Up to 50% of the refinery’s entire corrosion expense may occur in the crude unit. The root causes of the fouling and corrosion issues are often linked to the basic unit configuration choices, as ..

HP Reliability: Maintain proficiency in root-cause-failure analysis

Hydrocarbon Processing Staff: Bloch, Heinz P.

Earlier in the year, the author attended a series of client and organizers’ presentations at the 2013 TapRooT Summit in Gatlinburg, Tennessee. TapRooT is a structured failure analysis and trouble..

HP Reliability: Why users must update design contractors’ understanding

Hydrocarbon Processing Staff: Bloch, Heinz P.

In early 2012, a rotating equipment engineer was involved in a machinery quality assessment (MQA).1 Located halfway around the globe, this engineer’s new job was to oversee the engineering, procu..

HP Integration Strategies: Could remanufactured control components place HPI plants at risk?

ARC Advisory Group: Clayton, D.

The hydrocarbon processing industry (HPI) must address a number of potentially catastrophic safety issues. One issue, in particular, is the growing use of remanufactured equipment and components from ..

HP Viewpoint: Increase the visibility and reliability of all major plant assets

Dresser-Rand: Scheef, D.

Turbomachinery, essential to refining and petrochemical operations, has significant impact on plant production, maintenance and energy consumption. One of the most effective ways to improve turbomachi..

HP Engineering Case Histories: Case 75: Analyzing wear when troubleshooting

Consulting Engineer: Sofronas, A.

Wear occurs frequently on machinery. In its simplest terms, it is the undesirable removal of material. When troubleshooting the root cause of wear in equipment, the engineer’s interest should be ..

Mitigate fouling in crude unit overhead—Part 1

CH2M Hill: Sloley, A. W.

In a refinery crude distillation column, up to 40% of the total heat removal may be found in the tower overhead condenser. The quantity of duty available makes heat integration (HI) between the column..

Novel use of sulfiding agent prevents refinery shutdown

Lubrizol: Frank, T.
Coastal Chemical Co.: Bridges, W.

When an insufficient supply of acid gas threatened to shut down operations at a US refinery, quick thinking, along with the novel use of a sulfiding agent and a strong supply chain made all the difference.

HP Reliability: Leaders must allocate time for technology updates

Hydrocarbon Processing Staff: Bloch, Heinz P.

Just as a good medical doctor is expected to have wide knowledge on modern treatment options, we would expect reliability professionals to be equally informed on technology advances. There are numerou..

HP Innovations: Innovations

Hydrocarbon Processing Staff: Blume, Adrienne

Noncorrosive bearings have high load capacityEDT Corp. has added Type E Solution bearings (Fig. 1) to its Solution line of severe service bearings. Type E Solution bearings have high load capacity and..