snenoia FOUR STEPS SOLVE CRUDE-TOWER OVERHEAD CORROSION PROBLEMS - Ol & Gas Journal aper and print quality made scanning difficult on some of the older magazines, Please excuse any misprints or typos. FOUR STEPS SOLVE CRUDE-TOWER OVERHEAD CORROSION PROBLEMS 07/05/1993 Norman P. Lieberman Process Improvement Engineering Metairie, La. have shown that, in the crude oil distillation process, a two: most often suffers from severe ¢ ‘Troubleshooting experiences erhead system is the type of facility Changing the point of injection of the neutralizing amine is one of four factors that, used together, can reduce corrosion in these systems CORROSION red in performing oric acid (HCI) attack improvement Engineering has encou The most common problem Proc crude-unit troubleshooting is corrosion-related failure caused by hydroct (Fig. 1). Affected components are: eflux drums nser Lubes and + Atmospheric-tower overhe; + Atmospheric-tower fractionation trays * Vacuum-tower overhead condenser tubes and jet-ejector bodies. than mechanical failure caused by metal loss is the plugging of tra ion of corrosion praducts consistin; No less important nozzles, and condensers as @ result of the accumu chloride salts, iron sulfide, and ammonium bisulfides, htps:www.og) comlariclesiprintvolume- issue-27/n-his-ssuelrefningfour anosnenoia FOUR STEPS SOLVE CRUDE-TOWER OVERHEAD CORROSION PROBLEMS - Ol & Gas Journal PROBLEM ORIGIN Hydrochloric acid attack is one of the oldest and best-understood refinery process problems. This ‘would lead one to think that preventing localized hydrochloric acid attack would also be wel understood. Experience, however, indicates that this is far from true. e salt content of the brine dispersed in crudes is in the form of sodium chloride (NaCl). About 10% of the salt, The problem originates with the presence of salt water in crude oils. Most however, is present as magnesium chloride (MgCI2) and calcium chloride (CaCI2). In the presence of water and heat, these chloride salts hydrolyze to form HCL Of these salts, NaCl is the most heat-stable. CaC!2 is moderately heat-stable, and MgCl, is the least heat-stable, Most of the MgCl2 Will hydrolyze at typical crude-tower flash zone temperatures (about 650 F). Most o the NaCl will remain unaffected at these conditions, At typical vacuur-tower flash zone temperatures (770 F), a substantial amount of the CaCI2 also will hydrolyze, as will a small fraction of the NaCl It would be misleading to further attempt to quantify the extent of hydrolysis because of the effects of: © High oil-film temperatures in preheat furnaces * Catalytic effects of naphthenic acids on the hydrolysis reaction + Hydrocarbon residence time in the bottom e atmospheric and vacuum columns. DESALTER OPERATION Asingle-stage crude desalter should remove 90% of the salt cantent of the crude oil, Adouble- desalter operation should extract 99% of the sal ‘These statements create the comfort ting but misleading impression that double desalting removes troublesome salts before they can cause downstream problems, It is unfortunately far more difficult to remove MgCI2 than NaCl ple, the following chloria -salt removal efficiencies were observed in one single-stage htps:www.og) comlariclesiprintvolume-9ssue-27/n his ssuelreiningfour-sleps-solve-crude-lower-overheae-corrosion-prablems hil anosnenoia FOUR STEPS SOLVE CRUDE-TOWER OVERHEAD CORROSION PROBLEMS - Ol & Gas Journal + 90% NaCl removal * 50% CaCI2 removal + 40% MgCl2 removal, Because the hydrolysis of MgCI2 proceeds far more readily than that of NaCl. its potentially lower removal efficiency in the desalter will create a disproportionate downstream corrosion problem. Experience also indicates that the operations of desalters are, in many refineries, rather erratic. One client operating a two-stage desalter. Experienced salt-removal efficiencies varying between 65 and 95% and averaging 90%. Another refiner experienced intermittent desalter water carry-over caused by interface level-control problems Of course, during such upset conditions, the operators did not sample the desalted crude because they realized the desalter efficiency would be low. Based on observations, the principal problems with desalter efficiency are: + Level-control problems caused by plugging of level taps * Failure caused by shorting of electrical grids + Improper control of desalting chemicals and lack of pH control + Poor-quality desalter makeup water + Lowmix-valve delta pressure «= Low desalter-water low rate * Vaporization in the desalter + Erratic desalter back-pressure control ‘+ Sludge buildup in the bottom of the desalter. htps:www.og) comlariclesiprintvolume-9ssue-27/n his ssuelreiningfour-sleps-solve-crude-lower-overheae-corrosion-prablems hil ano