Technical College of Engineering

Department of Petrochemical Engineering

COURSE: Training seminar

Class: Third (2017 – 2018)

Name of Experiment: Atmospheric Distillation

Submitted by: Pashew Pirot
Number of Experiment: 1

Date of experiment: 13/ 2 /2018

Date of submission: 28/ 2 /2018

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

EVALUATION

Activity During Experiment & Procedure

Data & Results

Discussion, Conclusion & Answer to the Questions

Neat and tidy report writing

Overall Mark

*Name of evaluator: Dr. Firas

The objective of the experiment:

a) To purify a compound by separating it from a non-volatile or less-volatile

material.

b) To separate a mixture of two miscible liquids (liquids that mix in all

proportions) with different boiling points.

***************************************************************
Introduction:

Petroleum crude oils contain hundreds of different hydrocarbon compounds:

paraffins, naphthenes and aromatics as well as organic sulfur compounds,
organic nitrogen compounds and some oxygen containing hydrocarbons such
as phenols. Although crude oils generally do not contain olefins, they are
formed in many of the processes used in a petroleum refinery. The crude oil
fractionator does not produce products having a single boiling point, rather, it
produces fractions having boiling ranges. For example, the crude oil
fractionator produces an overhead fraction called "naphtha" which becomes a
gasoline component after it is further processed. The naphtha cut, as that
fraction is called, contains many different hydrocarbon compounds. Therefore
it has an initial boiling point of about 35 °C and a final boiling point of about
200 °C. Each cut produced in the fractionating columns has a different boiling
range. At some distance below the overhead, the next cut is withdrawn from
the side of the column and it is usually the jet fuel cut, also known as a
kerosene cut. The boiling range of that cut is from an initial boiling point of
about 150 °C to a final boiling point of about 270 °C, and it also contains
many different hydrocarbons. The next cut further down the tower is the diesel
oil cut with a boiling range from about 180 °C to about 315 °C. The boiling
ranges between any cut and the next cut overlap because the distillation
separations are not perfectly sharp. After these come the heavy fuel oil cuts
and finally the bottoms product, with very wide boiling ranges. All these cuts
are processed further in subsequent refining processes.

Experiment: Atmospheric distillation

Page 2
The difference between atmospheric and vacuum distillation:

Atmospheric Distillation Unit

Figure 1 – Typical PFD for an Atmospheric Distillation Unit

Crude oil is sent to the Atmospheric distillation unit after desalting and
heating. The purpose of atmospheric distillation is primary separation of
various «cuts» of hydrocarbons namely, fuel gases, LPG, naphtha, kerosene,
diesel and fuel oil. The heavy hydrocarbon residue left at the bottom of the
atmospheric distillation column is sent to vacuum distillation column for
further separation of hydrocarbons under reduced pressure. As the name
suggests, the pressure profile in atmospheric distillation unit is close to the
atmospheric pressure with highest pressure at the bottom stage which

Experiment: Atmospheric distillation

Page 3
gradually drops down till the top stage of the column. The temperature is
highest at the bottom of the column which is constantly fed with heat from
bottoms reboiler. The reboiler vaporizes part of the bottom outlet from the
column and this vapor is recycled back to the distillation column and travels
to the top stage absorbing lighter hydrocarbons from the counter current crude
oil flow. The temperature at the top of the column is the lowest as the heat at
this stage of the column is absorbed by a condenser which condenses a
fraction of the vapors from column overhead. The condensed hydrocarbon
liquid is recycled back to the column. This condensed liquid flows down
through the series of column trays, flowing counter current to the hot vapors
coming from bottom and condensing some of those vapors along the way.
Unit 5. Crude oil distillation. Lecture. Thus a reboiler at the bottom and a
condenser at the top along with a number of trays in between help to create
temperature and pressure gradients along the stages of the column. The
gradual variation of temperature and pressure from one stage to another and
considerable residence time for vapors and liquid at a tray help to create near
equilibrium conditions at each tray. So ideally we can have a number of
different vapor-liquid equilibria at different stages of this column with varying
temperature and pressure conditions. This means that the hydrocarbon
composition also varies for different trays with the variation in temperature
and pressure. The heaviest hydrocarbons are taken out as liquid flow from the
partial reboiler at bottom and the lightest hydrocarbons are taken out from the
partial condenser at the column overhead. Various other cuts of hydrocarbons
are taken out as side draws from different stages of the column. Starting from
LPG at the top stages, naphtha, kerosene, diesel and gas oil cuts are taken out
as we move down the stages of atmospheric column. The heaviest
hydrocarbon residue taken out from partial reboiler is sent to the Vacuum
distillation column for further separation under reduced pressure.

Experiment: Atmospheric distillation

Page 4
 Vacuum Distillation Unit

Figure 1 – Typical PFD of a Vacuum Distillation Unit Heavies

from the Atmospheric distillation column are heated to approximately 400˚C

in a fired heater and fed to the Vacuum distillation column where they are
fractionated into light vacuum gas oil (LVGO), heavy vacuum gas oil
(HVGO) and vacuum residue. Unit 5. Crude oil distillation. Lecture. Some
heavy hydrocarbons cannot be boiled at the operating temperature and
pressure conditions in the atmospheric distillation column. Hence they exit the
bottom of the column in liquid state and are sent to the vacuum distillation
column where they can be boiled at a lower temperature when pressure is
significantly reduced. Absolute operating pressure in a vacuum tower can be
reduced to 20 mm of Hg or less (atmospheric pressure is 760 mm Hg). In

Experiment: Atmospheric distillation

Page 5
addition, superheated steam is injected with the feed and in the tower bottom
to reduce hydrocarbon partial pressure to 10 mm Hg or less. Lower partial
pressure of the hydrocarbons makes it even easier for them to be vaporized,
thus consuming less heat energy for the process. Steam ejectors can be used to
suck the lighter hydrocarbon vapors at low pressure from the top of the
column. These vapors are then cooled down to condense the steam which had
been introduced in the column earlier. The condensed oily water is removed
and can be recycled to the column after boiling it. Hydrocarbon vapors are
taken out at this stage. Two different cuts of hydrocarbons – «light vacuum
gas oil» and «heavy vacuum gas oil» are separated in the vacuum distillation
column at different stages of the column, based on the difference between
their boiling point ranges. The liquid being drawn at low pressure needs to be
pumped. Then it is heated and partially recycled back to the column. Light
vacuum gas Oil is sent to a hydrotreater and then to a catalytic cracking unit to
obtain smaller chain hydrocarbons. Heavy vacuum gas oil is also sent for
cracking using hydrogen in a hydrocracking unit to produce smaller chain
hydrocarbons. Heavy hydrocarbons which cannot be boiled even under
reduced pressure remain at the bottom of the column and are pumped out as
vacuum residue. The vacuum distillation column bottom residue can only be
used for producing coke in a coker unit or to produce bitumen.

Discussion:
Distillation is one of the oldest and still most common methods for both the
purification and the identification of organic liquids. It is a physical process
used to separate chemicals from a mixture by the difference in how easily they
vaporize. As the mixture is heated, the temperature rises until it reaches the
temperature of the lowest boiling substance in the mixture, while the other
components of the mixture remain in their original phase in the mixture. The
resultant hot vapor passes into a condenser and is converted to the liquid,
which is then collected in a receiver flask. The other components of the
mixture remain in their original phase until the most volatile substance has all

Experiment: Atmospheric distillation

Page 6
boiled off. Only then does the temperature of the gas phase rises again until it
reaches the boiling point of a second component in the mixture, and so on.

Experiment: Atmospheric distillation

Page 7