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US 9,751,072 B2Granted
Treatment of heavy crude oil and diluent
AssigneeQuanta Associates, L.P.
InventorsBengt Arne Jarlsjo, Thomas Gieskes, Joe Travis Moore, Lance Dawson McCarver
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Abstract
An integrated process simultaneously removes the diluent and reduces the TAN, resulting in cost savings from the diluent recovery and increasing the value of the produced heavy crude stream by removing the acids and other contaminants, while reducing the overall energy requirements when compared to performing the two processes separately.
Claims11
A method for simultaneously recovering diluent from heavy bituminous crude oil and reducing the acidity comprising:
- heating a blend of bituminous crude oil and diluent to degradation of naphthenic acids in the crude oil;
- providing sufficient residence time at elevated temperatures for the decomposition reactions to reduce the acid concentrations to reduce total acid number by at least 75% and to simultaneously remove the diluent;
- and
- removing diluent by distillation.
1 more element
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.