COMSATS-LANCASTER Dual Degree Programme

Oil and Gas Production and Processing

Assignment No. 2
Submitted To:
Dr. Fahad Rehman
Submitted By:
M.Jahanzaib Khan
Registration No:
DDP-SP13-BEC/A-055

Department of Chemical Engineering

COMSATS Institute of Information and Technology
Lahore Campus

Q. Review the methods to isolate the chemical series from crude oil?
The crude oils are mostly based on two elements carbon and hydrogen and almost all crude oil
ranges from 82-87% carbon and 12-15% hydrogen. Crude oil contains three basic chemical
series: paraffins, naphthenes, and aromatics. The crude oils from different sources may not be
completely identical. [1]
Supercritical Fluid Extraction Method
High molecular weight present in crude oil that cannot be separated from distillation .So we use
another technique to fractionate these heavy oil by solvent extraction. And in this technique we
commercially use a low molecular weight paraffin to extract high quality deasphalted oil from
the low quality asphalene fraction.
After 1960 supercritical gasses are used to separate the heavy oils.so selectivity difference one
can obtain with super critical gases versus conventional liquid solvents. The supercritical gases
used for the separation are carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide and phase equilibrium data also
used for the extraction with the liquid solvents.
When gas enters into the compressor then it brings the system pressure and other part is made up
of stainless steel which is called as the extractor. so the gas enters into the bottom of the extractor
and dispersed with the help of stainless steel grid present in the extractor.
This extractor also contains feedstock oil and this oil can be distributed over glass breads to give
us a good contact between the gaseous solvent and oil. Extracted material and solvent leave the
extractor from the top.so pressure is reduced and it is collected for analysis.
To increase the yield of during supercritical extraction with CO for this we added ten percent
ethanol and heptane. [2]
Gilson MPLC System for SARA Fractionation of Crude Oil
Crude oil contains hydrocarbons and then it can derive the sulfur, nitrogen, hydrogen, oxygen
and organometellic. and these derived organic element compostion depends on the location,age
and on depth.Hydrocarbons in the crude oil are divided into four classes on the basis of polarity
and solubility.1.saturated 2. aromatics 3. resins and 4. asphaltenes.
Sara anlysis can be done to obtain the information about the quality of oils and bitumens.And
these result from the SARA fraction proportions also gives information about the asphaltene
stability within the crude oil.but this SARA analysis is not possible without the sample
preparation by the method of isotope analysis.

Gilson is a scientist. he developed the method to enable SARA fractionation bye using an
adaptable gilson Medium Pressure Liquid Chromatogrphy (MPLC) system.The Gilson MPLC
system is used to separate and prepare the sample of deasphatened solution which can be
obtained after n-pentene added in crude oil. The deasphatened solutin which we called the
maltene.so maltene can be separated from MPLC (Medium Pressure
Liquid Cromatography) system into three fractions. Saturates,Aromatics,Resins.100 mg of this
extract can be seperated for both traditional gravimetric quantification of each fraction and also
for final analysis from MPLC system.[3]

There are following method used to determine chemical series from crude oil

Flame Atomic Absorption Spectrometry (FAAS)

Electro-thermal Atomic Absorption Spectrometry (ET- AAS)
Chemical Vapour Generation AAS
Inductively Coupled Plasma Optical Emission Spectroscopy (ICP OES) [4]

Chromatographic Method
To isolate molecular fractios from heavy crude oil there are two method
1. n-parrafin extraction of the maltenes and asphaltenes from heavy crude oil
2. Separation of the maltenes into saturated hydrocarbon by liquid-solid chromatograph
Limitations of both methods is the lack of reproducible result because these methods are very
complex with similar asphaltene molecular structure and similar resins.[5]
1. Chromatographic Separation
In this method we can extract five molecular fractions from activated alumina.we use aluminaimpregnated heavy crude oil and activated alumina in a 2.5 cm * 75 cm glass column.snyder
polarities can elucidate the fractions.UV-Lamp can be used in this method to monitorized the
separation of saturated hyro carbon and aromatic hydrocarbon.
The colour of the aromatic hydrocarbon(1), is light yellow fraction.and aromatic hydrocarbon(2),
resins and asphaltenes were orange ,black and black-brown fractions.[6]

UV-Vis Spectroscopy
It is important to point out that the ASTM method starts with a n-pentane extraction of the
maltenes and asphaltenes. Then the maltenes are fractionated into saturated hydrocarbons (Le.,
paraffins and naphthenes) with n-pentane, and polar compounds (i.e., polar aromatics and resins)
with a 5050 benzene:acetone solution in two parallel assembled columns packed with
Attapulgas clay (30-60 mesh) and claykilica gel.
Aromatics are calculated by difference, or alternatively they can be recovered using toluene. The
Barwise method starts with an extraction of the saturated hydrocarbons with n-heptane, and then
follows it with the extraction of the aromatic hydrocarbons, Ni-porphyrins, V-porphyrins and a
residual polar fraction ith 80, 20 n-heptane CH,CI, solution, 5050 n-heptane,CH,CI,, CH,CI,,
50:50 toluene CH,OH solution, respectively in a column packed with silica. We consider that the
Ni-porphyrins and V-porphyrins form basically the asphaltene fraction.

REFERENCES

[1] Funk,E.W.; Irani, C.A. Recent Developments &I Separation Science 1977, 2,171.
[2] Edward W. Funk Signal Research Center , Inc. 50 UOP Plaza Des Plaines, IL 60016
[3]Freddy Moy and Fabrice Mangani - Gilson BV France & Toni R. Hofhine-Gilson,Inc
[4] Ackley, K.L., Day, J.A., Caruso, J.A., (2005), Separation of metalloporphyrins by capillary
electrophoresis with UV detection and inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometric
detection, J. Chromatogr. A., 888, 293-298.
[5] American Society for Testing and Materials, ASTM-D-2007-75,Annual Book of ASTM,
Standard Part 37,542 (1975).
[6] Osorio, E., Angulo, E., Segovia, S., Ysambertt, F, MArquez, N and De La Cruz,C., Act.
Cient. Venez., 45, 1 (1994).