Separation processes 2

Risk and Safety 5

Lecture V
Nazir mafakheri
Petroleum engineering
Introduction

On the onshore and offshore facility are processes which include high
pressure, flammable liquids, oil and gases and etc. There are two
main reasons, why the risk and safety focus should take place, which
are; Safety of people, surroundings and supply and second reason is
economy.

Specific legislation exists to deal with the hazards arising from the
operation of fixed and mobile installations, wells and pipelines. This is
supported by relevant legislation linked to generic industrial hazards.

Lecture 4
Introduction

Goals for the upstream oil and gas industry are:

Present risks in oil industry are: -To prevent major accidents with catastrophic
consequence
-Flare
-Explosions -To secure a step improvement in injury rates and
-Gas release work related ill health and consequent days lost
-Structural failure from work
-To support industrys goal to be the worlds safest
sector
-To secure more effective workplace involvement
-To maintain an effective regulatory framework

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Introduction
Besides using international standards, companies have
often their own standards and safety.

The supplement for health and safety is the management

system which is shown in figure 3 Demming wheel.

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 Emergency Shutdown System (EDS)

EDS monitors the process situation on the platform, in which are placed Remote
terminal units (RTUs). RTUs are connected to the main computer in the central
control room by the data highway for the safe communication. The EDS system
has four levels of shut downs:

Level 1: Total platform is shut down with automatic blow down and closes the
safety valves

Level 2: Total process/utility shut down with automatic blow down

Level 3: Total process shutdown with out blow down

Level 4: Local equipment shut down

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 Standard safety installations
In the processing is the control equipment of the oil and gas production platforms, which can be saved
and in case of its failure.

1. Remote controlled
ON/OFF valves
The remote control valves have double acting
pneumatic actuators. The pressure is
maintained in the chamber until the opposite
position of valve is needed. To ensure that the
wanted position of the valve is reached, there
are two sensors placed on the valves. The
signals are placed on the SCADA
2. High and low liquid level
controls
These controls could normally be float operated
pilots that actuate the valve on the inlet to the
separator, open a bypass around the separator,
sound warming alarm, or perform some other
functions to prevent any damage that might result
from high or low liquid levels in the separators.

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 Standard safety installations

3. High and low pressure controls

These controls are installed on separators to prevent excessively high

or low pressures from interfering with normal operation. These could be
mechanical, pneumatic or electric and can warn the alarm.

4.High and low temperature controls

Temperature control may be installed on the separator to shut down in

the unit, to open or close a bypass to a heater, or to sound a warning
should the temperature in the separator become too high or too low.

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 Standard safety installations

5. Safety relieve
valves

A spring loaded safety

valve is usually installed on
the top of the separator. It is
primary as a warning and in
most instances; they are
too small to handle the full
rated fluid capacity of the
separator.

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 Standard safety installations

6. Hydraulic emergency valves

For ESD shutdowns the reliable valves

are needed to ensure that, the valve is
in safe position. For this purpose
hydraulic actuated valves are used. The
valve is affected by a spring making in
fail safe. Under the normal
circumstances the actuator is
pressurized. It means the valve is open.
In case of an ESD the pressure in the
actuator will be stopped and the valve
will change to safe position.

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 Safety heads
Safety heads

The safety head contains thin metal membrane that is designed to rupture when the
pressure in the separator exceeds determined value. The safety head disk is
usually selected so that it will not rupture until the safety relieve valve has opened.

High pressure separator safety

1.The water of high-high and low-low alarm trips on EDS level 4, which closes the
water outlet. It is necessary to close the oil outlet in case of the high-high alarm,
because any water in the crude oil will be removed in the low pressure separator.
The low-low and high-high alarm on the oil level have a separate transmitter and
trip EDS level 3. In the order to increase the safety of the HP separator, there can
be used two parallel valves for flare. If one fails the other will take over.

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 Safety heads
Low pressure separator safety

The water trips low-low alarm trip on EDS level 4, which closes the water outlet to ovoid the oil in
the water outlet. Water high-high alarm trips the EDS level 3, which closes the oil and water outlets.
The oil level of high-high and low-low causes an EDS level 3, the EDS level 4 would not be enough
because the oil outlet is closed by the EDS level 3. The high-high alarm indicates that oil is
accumulating in the separator and low-low alarm indicates that gas could come into the oil outlet.
For safety of the low pressure separator is flare system needed.

Additional level alarms

In vessels with level control like separators and degasses, the high-high and low-low alarm are
installed. Separate level transmitters are installed for the alarm signals. This gives an alarm,
which runs independently from the level control. If the level transmitter for the level control
fails, the high-high and low-low alarms would still be in function.

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 Standard safety installations

Combustible-gas detection system

These systems are required in most offshore operations. They are installed as
early warning devices to warn operators to potentially hazardous conditions
where no dangers exist normally. Modern systems have catalytic sensing heads
whose electrical characteristics depend on the concentration of the hydrocarbon
gases surrounding the sensor. Units are calibrated and have known variations in
their electrical output that is based on the gas concentration in the area of the
sensor. Gas sensors are normally connected to a central monitoring panel
equipped with individual sensors readouts calibrate in percent of lower explosive
limits.

.
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 Standard safety installations

H2S gas detectors

These detectors are essential where sour crude oil and gas is handled or
produced, because of the extreme toxicity of H2S. Sensors continue to improve,
but reliability and maintenances are continuation problems. Because their
vulnerability, gas detectors must be installed where they are protected the water
spray, drilling mud and other contaminants. They are generally installed in areas
where leaks or accumulations might be expected under abnormal conditions.

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 Standard safety installations

Fire detection systems

These detectors are based on UV spectrum. The operating principle

of UV sensors in that their sensitivity to the UV radiations from frame
provides an alarm out put in the presence of UV radiation from open
flames.

Generally the combination of strategy placed UV sensors are fusible

plugs forms the optimum fire detection and automatic shut-in system.

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Introduction

Surface-controlled subsurface safety valves

These valves are installed in the production tubing below mud line. They are
hydraulically actuated and held open during normal operation by pressurized
hydraulic fluid in their individual control lines. They are designed to be fail-
safe in that they close when a loss of hydraulic pressure occurs. On modern
platforms, these valves are generally separate, centralized, hydraulic power
units dedicated only to their control. Surface power units and their associated
alarms and controls are available as specially packaged units. Problem is
that these valves are expensive to repair.

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Introduction

Surface safety valves

These kinds of valves are situated between the wellhead and the production
manifold. The actuators on these valves are designed to be fail-saving closed
and can be actuated either hydraulically or pneumatically by the automatic
shutdown systems and/or the manual emergency shutdown. These valves
are usually activated in almost platforms or process shut-ins. They are
simpler devices and are less expensive to repair, more rugged and more
accessible.

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Introduction

Surface safety valves

Nearly all platforms are equipped with automatically controlled riser shut off valves on pipelines and
flow lines feeding or leaving the platform. The inlet of these valves is to allow an isolation of the platform
from any outside source or flammable fuel in the event of the platform accident. In the case of sub sea
wells, it frequently is desirable to shut in the wells by simply blocking the flow lines rather than operating
the sub sea valves unnecessarily.

The final element in any safety system should be the manual EDS. These controls can be either
electrically operated solenoids or pneumatically or hydraulically pilot valves that control various shut
down control circuits around the facility EDS stations usually are located on boat landings, or helidecks,
in processes areas, and in control rooms.

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 Auxiliary systems

These systems include scrubbers, degassers, hydro cyclones,

flare systems, air supply systems, drinking water systems,
sewage systems, fire fighting systems, hot water systems,
hydraulic oil systems, diesel oil systems, etc., but we will
explain only flare systems and hydro cyclones.

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 Flare systems
Size and safety in design of the flare system involves consideration of thermal radiation, explosion hazards, liquid
carry over, noise and etc.
There are several types of the flaring system:

Pipe flare

This type has vertical or horizontal pipes with external

ignition pilots. They are used for hydrocarbon vapor
streams such as Methane, Hydrogen and Carbon
Monoxide, which give out limited smoke when are burned.
Heavier hydrocarbons may be burned with smoking.
Velocity for open pipe flows should be limited to Mach 0.4
to flame lift off.

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Flare systems

Smokeless flares

Vertical, single or multiple

burners design to properly
mix O2, from the air with
relieved vapors for
complete combustion. Used
for smokeless disposal of
hydrocarbon streams.
These flares use a variety
of methods such as stream,
high pressure fuel gas and
water spray.

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 Flare systems

Endothermic flares

They are elevated in incinerators for low

heat content streams. They can be used on
low heat waste streams, such as Sulphur
plant tail gas.

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Flare systems

Reasons for flaring gas

-Overpressure protection of the platform topsides

-Platform depressuring (Blowdown)

-Maintenance / purging

-Continuation of oil production following loss of gas processing

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Reboilers

Reboilers are heat exchangers typically used to provide heat to the bottom of industrial distillation columns.
They boil the liquid from the bottom of a distillation column to generate vapors which are returned to the
column to drive the distillation separation. The heat supplied to the column by the reboiler at the bottom of
the column is removed by thecondenser at the top of the column.
Proper reboiler operation is vital to effective distillation. In a typical classical distillation column, all the vapor
driving the separation comes from the reboiler. The reboiler receives a liquid stream from the column bottom
and may partially or completely vaporize that stream. Steam usually provides the heat required for the
vaporization.

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Reboilers

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 Steam generator
In the oil and gas industry is steam used to adjust the temperatures for the feeds to the separation of the crude
oil.

Advantages of using the steam

Steam is cheap to generate
It is clean, colorless and sterile
Has a very high heat content which results in smaller pipe diameter carrying a greater amount of heat relative to
water at the same pressure
Releases heat a constant temperature by phase change
Readily distributed and easily controlled

Disadvantages
Steam is distributed under pressure which means that the leaks in the system can be very costly

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Features of different heating media
Feature Heating media
Hot
Steam water Hot oil
moder
heat content high ate low

cheap with some

source cost treatment cheap expensive
moder relatively
heat transfer good ate poor
requir
circulating pump not required ed required
pipe size small large large
pressure needed for high
temperature high high low
flash loss problems present no no
less
corrosion problems possible likely unlikely
 Steam generator
General overview of the steam generator

The steam is normally generated using a monotube or coil steam generator on oil platforms. These two types of generators are preferred
because:

- They do not hold bulk water = they are lighter

- Occupy limited space
- Rapid start up
- No risk of steam explosion since no storage of large volumes of heated water

Principle of the operation

Water is forced into the tube end furthermost from the fire and travels toward the hotter and hotter areas of the generator. As the water
travels through the tube, heat is absorbed from the tube wall and its raises until it reaches the saturation temperature. At this point the
water begins to boil. The temperature remains almost constant in this saturation state until all the water has vaporized into the steam. The
temperature continues to rise till the supersaturated steam leaves the boiler.

The steam temperature is a function of its pressure. The steam, usually saturated or very high quality, is then distributed to the heat
exchanges where is used, and provides heat by condensing back to water. The desired temperature at the heat exchanger can be
adjusted by a pressure reducing valve. To ensure minimum heat losses from the distribution pipes, suitable insulation materials are used
(like fiber glass material for instance).
Steam generator