I find it amazing how "naphtha" can mean crude oil, diesel, kerosene, gasoline or kind of white spirit. EDIT: oh and it comes from Akkadian! how many Akkadian words do you know?
And RP-1 Rocket Fuel and Jet-A Jet Fuel are both Kerosene!
How an oil refinery works
91–100 of 209 posts
Re: How an oil refinery works
#92The article is quick to point out the huge role of oil in the modern energy mix. It also fails to note that most of the energy ends up us waste heat. The so called "Primary energy fallacy". Other than that, it's a great read.
To me (as someone who has worked on oil rigs, oil pipelines, oil refineries, and chemical plants), crude oil seems far more valuable as a material than as an energy source. It feels like a damned shame that we're still combusting so much of it for heat rather than reserving it for physical materials. I understand the ways that economics are very important, and that the economics still currently favor burning a large…
There is way more carbon in the ground as rocks than as oil. If you have plenty of energy, the difference is quite manageable.
Besides, as somebody already pointed out, there is that CO2 on the air that we actually want to get rid of. It's nothing compared to the rocks, and a little harder to get, but getting it first would improve things a lot.
Re: How an oil refinery works
#93Earlier quoted context omitted.
We can always make polymers and HydroCarbons in general from other sources if we have energy abundance. We literally can just capture the CO2 we emitted from burning fossil and make it plastics. Of course this does not make sense in a world where we do not have enough energy to even keep datacenters open. Edit: To clarify, I do not propose burning fossils to capture CO2 and make plastics. I am a Thermo Laws believer.
That sounds like a hack from late-game Factorio: pollute enough that you can just pull iron filings right out of the air. Everyone wins! Except the meatbags who need to breathe the air …
Assuming the damn rain does not throw your iron down to the ground before it reaches its destination. But then again you have rivers as a plan B.
Re: How an oil refinery works
#94My father actually works at the Jamnagar refinery. I was bought up in there seeing and visiting the refinery as families are allowed for some trips every now and then. I learnt a lot of this process of refining out of curiosity of what my father did and it was just so cool. The refinery in context is the world's largest since more than a decade and seeing it with your own eyes, it feels like a wonder of the world for…
Would love to hear stories about it. Reliance is working on replicating the Jamnagar refinery approach in America [0] now as well. It's interesting to both see Asian majors and EPCs increasingly dominating the petrochemical chain as well as see an industry that the US used to lead in increasingly become dependent those partners. What a massive shift in just 25 years. [0] - https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026…
When all you can produce are finance bros this is the result.
Re: How an oil refinery works
#95If you're interested in how the oil industry as a whole operates and why, Oil 101 is an interesting read.
By Morgan Downey?
Re: How an oil refinery works
#96> an astounding 90% of chemical feedstocks are derived from oil or gas
What I often wonder is, as the demand for oil declines, the economies of scale in oil production should, too. If that is the case, will not the price of everything with oil byproduct inputs go up? In other words, will the transition to other energy sources actually be highly inflationary?
Re: How an oil refinery works
#97Earlier quoted context omitted.
A few corrections. Credentials: I am a Chemical Engineer in a Senior Tecnical Leadership position at a refinery with over thirty years of experience. 1) API gravity is the density of the crude oil. Higher API = lower density. We use this unit of measure because it magnifies the differences in densities vs. using conventional units of measure. 2) Refiners in the US mix different crude types to maximize the objective f…
[off topic] Given your background,I was wondering if you could offer some clarification if I'd read some Bs or just misunderstood. Long ago I had read something in a petrochemical book, maybe I got wrong, but one little section I skimmed over seemed to point out a modern refinery cracking plant could use vegetable input stock with I think was a caveat in regard to cleaning or addition by-products. Is this feasible or…
Yes, Hydroprocessing units at refineries can either co-process vegetable oil with hydrocarbons or run 100% on vegetable oil after some modifications.
Vegetable oils are tri-glycerides. These molecules can be cracked into three long chain paraffins and a propane molecule by reacting them with hydrogen at high temperature and pressure over a catalyst. This makes a raw diesel fuel that then needs to be isomerized to lower the cloud point (basically when it begins to freeze). The end result is a drop in replacement for fossil diesel fuel that burns smoother and cleaner.
Two refineries in the SF Bay Area have converted from fossil fuel operation to manufacturing this renewable diesel.
Fun fact: over 70% of diesel sold in California is now renewable or bio diesel. Both types start with tri glycerides - either vegetable oil, waste cooking oil or animal fats.
Re: How an oil refinery works
#98Earlier quoted context omitted.
> They have surface reservoirs Sure sounds like potential issues for septic systems > protected watershed areas And they're protected by things like being choosy about approving septic systems I'd imagine > The "ground" is effectively the filter. And it requires so much "ground" to properly "filter", hence the mounds. > The problem is high water table So we both agree there's a high water table, and high water tables…
Gotta love that ivory tower smarmy attitude. >And it requires so much "ground" to properly "filter", hence the mounds. There is no point in building up if the ground is sufficient. MN has basically decided they're not gonna bother considering what that means and just make everyone do mounds at great expense. >So we both agree there's a high water table, and high water tables can give challenges for properly operating…
> There is no point in building up if the ground is sufficient.
Sure sounds like it isn't, at least according to the county.
> we both agree there's a high water table
> That's tangential
Its fundamental to the decision of septic design, not tangential. Its not a dishonest strawman to bring up the core, fundamental concept at issue here.
> dumping cancer causing chemicals on the ground that's a separate problem than organic waste
Yeah that's right, my waste is fine, their waste is a problem. Who cares if my neighbors have to drink my shit?
> you don't get how it works.
I sure do.
> The whole point of a septic is that it's fine as long as you don't sink your well pipe through the leech field.
If the ground water is too high, you'll have more problems. Like, say, potentially some random property in the land of 10,000 lakes.
> I hope someday you buy property and seek to further develop it
I already have, and I haven't purposefully flooded out or poisoned my neighbors to do it.
> I'm not gonna bother picking your comment apart any further.
I'd potentially have a different opinion if I actually had some real facts about the property other than just some random property in a place known to have a high water table having an issue getting septic permitted. You even said yourself its got a high water table at the property! It honestly doesn't seem surprising to me to see a place like that having an issue with septic systems. But just a "trust me bro gubmit bad" attitude doesn't really change my opinion.
Cool beans buddy. Have a good night.
Re: How an oil refinery works
#99Crikey we have got so far to go with energy production.
Thankfully, the top consumer China, is building nuclear reactors at an unfathomable rate.
Re: How an oil refinery works
#100Earlier quoted context omitted.
[off topic] Given your background,I was wondering if you could offer some clarification if I'd read some Bs or just misunderstood. Long ago I had read something in a petrochemical book, maybe I got wrong, but one little section I skimmed over seemed to point out a modern refinery cracking plant could use vegetable input stock with I think was a caveat in regard to cleaning or addition by-products. Is this feasible or…
Yes, Hydroprocessing units at refineries can either co-process vegetable oil with hydrocarbons or run 100% on vegetable oil after some modifications. Vegetable oils are tri-glycerides. These molecules can be cracked into three long chain paraffins and a propane molecule by reacting them with hydrogen at high temperature and pressure over a catalyst. This makes a raw diesel fuel that then needs to be isomerized to low…
Started my career working in AI for a company that had a couple large refineries (I didnt dare refer to what we were doing as statistics because those guys had all been fired a decade before after attempting to perform some back magic they called six sigma), pipelines, a fleet of ethanol plants (at the time) and a couple biodiesel bets, including one that attempted to convert corn oil into biodiesel.
I was blessed to have a leader who wanted us to spend a lot of time on the field, working turnarounds doing, whatever I could to be helpful, etc. to learn the business and build relationships.
Working around the refineries, especially during turnaround, was a crash course in constraint theory and economics.
Good times.
At any rate, all of that was to qualify that most people would not believe how much time and money has been wasted trying to find innovative new ways to serve and capitalize on the CA biodiesel market.