With the diversification of crude oil types brought about by U.S. shale production, refineries have increased risk for vessel and piping corrosion. Many of the aging refineries also are operating past the design life of some of their plant assets. In a Chemical...
The American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers (AFPM) Annual Meeting is rapidly approaching—March 19-21 in San Antonio Texas. It is: …the world's premier refining meeting, assembling key executives, decision-makers, and technical experts from refining businesses,...
A recent Hydrocarbon Processing article highlighted the changing financial picture for refiners over the past 24 months: Those margins collapsed this year in a global fuel supply glut, providing an incentive for refiners to undertake the shutdowns necessary for...
For refineries, blending operations can be challenging due to unscheduled downtime, off-spec production requiring reblending operations and quality giveaways by exceeding specifications. I caught up with Emerson’s Marcelo Carugo who noted that poor recipe management...
Petrochemical producers and refiners are having to adjust to big changes over the last couple of years. With the large supply of natural gas and natural gas liquids (NGLs) from shale combined with the opening of U.S. oil exports and new LNG exports, prices and supply...
The list of workshops, short course, plenary sessions, exhibits and more at the October 24-28 Emerson Exchange conference can be overwhelming. If you've already registered, the MyExchange tool can help you find, plan and schedule the sessions you'd like to attend. If...
An Environmental Leader article, How Data Analytics is Changing the Oil & Gas Industry, highlights challenges in refining opportunity crudes: Opportunity crudes, such as heavy oil produced from the Canadian oil sands, and light tight oils produced by hydraulic...
With many of the hydrocarbons falling in price, one exception has been octane (C8H18). Its structure comes in many forms or isomers—18 according to its Wikipedia entry. These octanes are: …a family of hydrocarbon that are typical components of gasoline. They are...
The mindset in most plant and production facility turnarounds is to get things fixed as fast as possible in order to get the facility back on line. At the American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers (AFPM) Annual Meeting earlier this year, Emerson's Marcelo Carugo...
The abundance of discounted crude oil, or opportunity crudes, as they are known in refinery parlance, has shifted refinery operators' mindsets over the past few years. In a Hydrocarbon Engineering article, Equip for Opportunity Crudes, Emerson's Marcelo Carugo and Tim...
We've discussed in earlier posts how opportunity crudes, while reducing feedstock costs, increase the complexity of operating a refinery. At a monthly meeting of the South Texas section of the AIChE, Emerson's Tim Olsen presented The New World of Opportunity Crudes....
Technology changes come at so quickly, it is something difficult to process how they can be used to help us improve performance. In our world of process automation, these changes must be proven over time before being put into widespread use. For example, WirelessHART...
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This blog features expert perspectives from Emerson's automation professionals on industry trends, technologies, and best practices. The information shared here is intended to inform and educate our global community of users and partners.