Study deasphalting process in normal and supercritical extraction using different solvents

Author(s)

Leandro Lodi

• Document type: Doctoral Thesis
• Press: Campinas, SP.
• Institution: Universidade Estadual de Campinas (UNICAMP). Faculdade de Engenharia Química
• Defense date: 2013-11-29

Examining board members

Maria Regina Wolf Maciel; César Benedito Batistella; Erika Tomie Koroishi Blini; Claudete Bernardo Henriques; Vanessa Trevisan Mochi

• Advisor: Maria Regina Wolf Maciel; Viktor Oswaldo Cárdenas Concha

Abstract

Nowadays, Brazil has a large demand for asphalt due to reconstruction and/or construction of new roads. In order to assure this request, not only in the quantitative aspect, but also to improve the quality of asphalt, the market searchs for the development of pavement types of high durability, with mixtures of high modulus (MAM).This thesis has as general objective to study the process of supercritical deasphalting in pilot scale of heavy and superheavy petroleum waste obtained by conventional vacuum distillation process. Several extraction solvents mainly water and CO2 was tested and compared with propane which is the solvent used in the deasphalting process, and whose studies were developed at Optimization, Design and Advanced Control Laboratory (LOPCA), and at the Laboratory of Separation Process Development (LDPS) and at the Laboratory of Petroleum Valuation (VALPET) at School of Chemical Engineering (FEQ), State University of Campinas (UNICAMP). The work aims to replace the process of liquid-liquid extraction currently used for conventional deasphalting, trying to introduce operating gains, such as reduced processing time and increasing the quantity of materials obtained, i.e., process optimization. A computational study (using commercial simulator) of a supercritical deasphalting process also be performed, studying the thermodynamic and operational properties of process, which allows to achieve operational gains. In this thesis, experiments of supercritical or quasi-critical extraction of asphaltenes and resins of waste petroleum be performed in order to obtain data from the supercritical separation unit already developed and built up at the laboratories and for process optimization using experimental planning. With the development of the project has been possible to separate petroleum compounds with solvents: water, CO2 and ethanol, as well as the propane used in industrial processes. Finally, the study presents new extraction techniques in the process of solvent deasphalting promising considered less harmful to the environment. (AU)

• FAPESP's process: 11/00875-1 - STUDY PROCESS DEASPHALTING DURING NORMAL AND SUPERCRITICAL EXTRACTION USING DIFFERENT SOLVENTS.
• Grantee: Leandro Lodi
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Doctorate