Escolar Documentos
Profissional Documentos
Cultura Documentos
CHAPTER 11
PROCESSING LIGHT ENDS
The Essence of Light Ends Processing
The purpose of light ends processing is to process the light ends (methane through butane) to remove
contaminants, primarily sulfur, and separate into components. This is accomplished by absorption and
fractionating utilizing various gas plant configurations. Gas plants are usually segregated into a saturates gas
plant, a catalytic cracking gas plant, and a thermal gas plant associated with cokers and visbreakers. The
segregation provides for better separation of paraffinic and olefinic materials.
Major Types of Processing Units
There are normally at least two light ends processing units in a refinery. One is a Saturates Gas Plant, or an
analogous name for the function, for processing vapors collected from crude units, reformers, alkylation units,
hydrotreater fractionators, tank vapor recovery systems and any other sources of saturated light hydrocarbons.
The other plant is called the Catalytic Cracking Gas Plant or some similar name. This unit is normally located
adjacent to the Fluid Catalyst Cracking Unit.
There can be a third recovery plant, associated with thermal operations such as visbreakers or cokers. They are
not desirable for Saturates Gas Plant feed because they contain olefins. On the other hand their inclusion in
Catalytic Light Ends Unit feed dilutes the concentration of olefins such as propylene and contaminates the olefin
products with diolefinic material. The thermal light-ends recovery operation is frequently included with coker
units.
Saturates Gas Plant
A Saturates Gas Plant is sometimes an older unit with a variety of expansion and modification steps included
over a period of time as the refinery became larger and more complex and as emission reduction became more
important. The plant is sometimes served by a set of booster stations, that is, compressor stations that collect
low-pressure vapors. Tank farm recovery systems are a classic example of such a recovery system that feed the
Saturates Gas Plant. The gas plants continue to be revised to permit varying fractionation requirements for
gasoline components.
A simplified flow sheet for a more recently designed Saturates Gas Plant is presented. The sketch is mostly
useful as an indication of the process steps normal or common for processing the saturate light ends produced in
the various units. It comprises recovery of propane and heavier as liquids and then separating the liquids into
components.
The fractionator overhead gas from the crude unit and other sources is cooled and the liquids and vapors are fed
to the deethanizer. The overhead gases go to the absorber and then to the sponge oil absorber for maximum
propane recovery. Fuel gas goes to amine treating for removal of hydrogen sulfide that is converted to sulfur
The net crude tower overhead is fed to the absorber as absorber oil. A distillate from the crude unit is used as
the sponge oil, which is recycled to the crude unit for additional light-ends recovery.
Page 11-1
Deethanizer bottoms is fed to a train of fractionators. One sequence is depropanizer making LPG, followed by a
deisobutanizer making isobutane for alkylation, then by a debutanizer taking normal butane overhead and
making light straight run gasoline as bottoms. This is one sequence for recovering the light straight run gasoline
from the atmospheric crude tower overhead.
But fractionation facilities for light hydrocarbons and naphtha are variable. Naphtha fractionation can depend on
whether light straight run gasoline is taken overhead or as a side stream at the atmospheric crude unit. It also
depends on what facilities for separating propane and recovering isobutane are provided at the alkylation plant.
Sponge
Absorber
Naphtha
absorbent
Lean Oil
Ethane
Rich Oil
LPG
(propane & butane)
Absorber
Deethanizer
Gas
(from many
sources)
Depropanizer
Debutanizer
Paraffinic Gasoline
In any event, the naphtha must be separated for inclusion in light straight run gasoline and provision must be
made some place for separation of propane for LPG, isobutane for alkylation and normal butane for gasoline
blending. It should also be noted that operations in a refinery vary substantially from day to day and month to
month. Different crudes are usually processed depending on which is available at the best price at the time. And
what products are in highest demand. Processing requirements for a light ends processing plant often vary by
50% or more from normal values.
Catalytic Cracking Gas Plant
A simplified flow sheet for a more recently designed Catalytic Cracking Gas Plant is presented, which shows
the similarity of the Catalytic Cracking Gas Plant to the Saturates Gas Plant. The difference is mostly related to
producing olefinic streams for alkylation or polymerization. However, the Catalytic Light Ends Unit is usually
Page 11-2
located adjacent to the Fluid Catalytic Cracking Unit and takes as its feed the overhead from the primary
fractionator of the cat unit. It was provided as part of the catalytic cracking unit design.
The unit employs a reboiled absorber deethanizer combination, with a sponge oil absorber similar to the
arrangement in the modern Saturates Gas Plant. Sponge oil comes from the catalytic cracking unit primary
fractionator. The cat gas compressor, not shown on this sketch, compresses the fractionator overhead gases to
gas plant operating pressure. The compressor is usually run at full load. It is one of the capacity limitations to
the fluid catalytic cracking unit. It is very sensitive to the hydrogen content of the gas that in turn can be
affected by excessive heavy metals being deposited on the catalyst from the gas oil feed.
Gases are first processed for recovery of propane/propylene and heavier light ends components plus the catalytic
gasoline stream. The collected recovery must then be processed to separate propylene and then butylenes and
butanes and perhaps even separate the C5 fraction for special handling, such as alkylation or blending in certain
grades of gasoline.
Catalytic Cracker Gas Plant
Olefinic Gas Feeds
Gas to amine treating for H2S
removal
Sponge
Absorber
Cat
Gasoline
absorbent
Lean Oil
Rich Oil
Ethane
Absorber
Deethanizer
Gas
(propane and
lighter from
Cat Cracker)
Depropanizer
Debutanizer
Olefinic Gasoline
The butane/butylene stream can be alkylated or can be directed first to a methyl tertiary butyl ether (MTBE)
plant to react out the isobutylene with methanol. Isobutylene is the least desirable alkylation feed of all the
butylenes. The normal butane can be removed from the alkylation circuit for gasoline blending by debutanizing
the alkylate. The alkylation plant usually will have facilities for purifying isobutane for recycle to alkylation
reactors. Catalytic butane/butylene stream is usually a preferred alkylation plant feed and especially if
isobutylene is removed.
There are various options for processing catalytic cracking unit naphtha. It can be fractionated to make higher
octane light cat naphtha and higher sulfur containing heavy cat naphtha. It can be processed to produce catalytic
pentylenes (amylenes) for alkylation or isopentane for production of tertiary amyl methyl ether (TAME).
Some catalytic light ends units have had to be modified and expanded to accommodate the differing yield
patterns from high activity zeolite catalysts. Higher activity catalysts can be used to produce more light olefins
such as propylene and butylenes for alkylation. Other high activity catalyst combinations increase the yield of
catalytic gasoline.
It is becoming more common for refiners to recover the ethane/ethylene and the hydrogen from the catalytic
cracking unit off gas. This is usually done with cryogenic facilities or a chilled absorber system. Hydrogen is in
demand for hydrotreating and the ethane/ethylene is used for ethylene plant feed stock. The higher recovery
also increases recovery of propylene/propane to almost 100 percent, another credit for such operations.
Page 11-4