Chevron U.s.a. Inc.

Chevron Research & Technology Company

Chevron Research Company

Other

Bruce Edward Reynolds

Julie Chabot

Shuwu Yang

Kaidong Chen

Darush Farshid

Alexander E Kuperman

Oleg Mironov

Robert W Bachtel

Axel Brait

Chi-Wen Hung

Joseph V Nguyen

Erin Maris

Ling Jiao

Christopher Alan Powers

Bo Kou

Pak C Leung

Jaime R Lopez

Harold J Trimble

Robert J Klett

David E Earls

David N Brossard

Andre R Da Costa

Paul F Bryan

Krishniah Parimi

Bruce E Stangeland

James Murphy

Christopher Paul Dunckley

James R Stoy

Donald Henry Mohr

Kirk R Gibson

Rahul Shankar Bhaduri

Abdenour Kemoun

Richard S Threlkel

Steven Xuqi Song

Donald Kuehne

Seyi Abiodun Odueyungbo

Lalit S Shah

Vivion Andrew Brennan

Donald A Bea

Goutam Biswas

Jose Guitian Lopez

Fred W Lam

Sean Solberg

Fernando J Antezana

Chi W Hung

Kenneth Kwik

Modinat Kotun

Oluwaseyi Abiodun Odueyungbo

Fred D Brent

Rahul S Bhaduri

Erin P Maris

Donald L Kuehne

An apparatus is disclosed for the hydroconversion of hydrocarbon feedstock with a hydrogen gas at elevated temperature and pressure with the use of a catalyst. The apparatus is a reactor vessel with a grid plate distributor for improved gas liquid distribution. The distributor comprises a grid plate and a bubble cap assembly with a plurality of tubular risers extending through the grid plate. Each tubular riser has an upper section above the grid plate and a lower section below the grid plate, the lower section terminated with an open bottom end for ingress of the hydrogen gas and hydrocarbon feedstock, the upper section having a closed top terminated with a housing cap. Each tubular riser has at least a vertical slot and a least a laterally placed opening sufficiently sized such that in operation, the liquid level in the zone below the grid plate is above the vertical slot and below the laterally placed opening.

Apparatus and method for hydroconversion

A process to upgrade heavy oil and convert the heavy oil into lower boiling hydrocarbon products is provided. The process employs a catalyst slurry comprising catalyst particles with an average particle size ranging from 1 to 20 microns. In the upgrade process, spent slurry catalyst in heavy oil is generated as an effluent stream, which is subsequently recovered/separated from the heavy oil via membrane filtration. In one embodiment, dynamic filtration is used for the separation of the heavy oil from the catalyst particles. Valuable metals can be recovered from catalyst particles for subsequent re-use in a catalyst synthesis unit, generating a fresh slurry catalyst.

Heavy oil upgrade process including recovery of spent catalyst

A method to upgrade heavy oil feedstock using an ebullated bed reactor and a novel catalyst system is provided. The ebullated bed reactor system includes two different catalyst with different characteristics: an expanded catalyst zone containing particulate catalyst having a particle size of greater than 0.65 mm; and a slurry catalyst having an average particle size ranging from 1 to 300 &#x3bc;m. The slurry catalyst is provided to the ebullated bed system containing the heavy oil feedstock, and entrained in the upflowing hydrocarbon liquid passing through the ebullated bed reaction zone. The slurry catalyst reduces the formation of sediment and coke precursors in the ebullating bed reactor system. The slurry catalyst is prepared from rework materials, which form a slurry catalyst in-situ upon mixing with the heavy oil feedstock.

Hydroprocessing catalysts and methods for making thereof

A method to upgrade heavy oil feedstock using an ebullated bed reactor and a novel catalyst system is provided. The ebullated bed reactor system includes two different catalyst with different characteristics: an expanded catalyst zone containing particulate catalyst having a particle size of greater than 0.65 mm; and a slurry catalyst having an average particle size ranging from 1 to 300 &#x3bc;m. The slurry catalyst is introduced to the ebullated bed system with the heavy oil feedstock, and entrained in the upflowing hydrocarbon liquid passing through the ebullated bed reaction zone. The slurry catalyst reduces the formation of sediment and coke precursors in the ebullating bed reactor system. The slurry catalyst is prepared from at least a water-soluble metal precursor and pre-sulfided prior to being introduced with the heavy oil feedstock to the reactor system, or sulfided in-situ in the ebullated bed reactor in another embodiment.

A method to reduce metal deposit in the hydroprocessing or upgrade of heavy oil feedstock is provided. The method comprises feeding an improved catalyst feed to the system, with the improved catalyst feed comprising a fresh slurry catalyst and a deoiled spent catalyst, with the deoiled spent catalyst being present in an amount of at least 10% the catalyst feed for the heavy oil upgrade system to have at least a 5% reduction in metal contaminant build-up compared to heavy oil upgrade system without the deoiled spent catalyst in the feed.

A method for preparing an improved slurry catalyst for the upgrade of heavy oil feedstock is provided. In one embodiment, the process comprises: sulfiding at least a metal precursor solution with at least a sulfiding agent forming a sulfided Group VIB catalyst precursor, the metal precursor solution having a pH of at least 4 and a concentration of less than 10 wt. % of Primary metal in solution; and mixing the catalyst precursor with a hydrocarbon diluent to form the slurry catalyst composition. The slurry catalyst prepared therefrom has a BET total surface area of at least 100 m/g, a total pore volume of at least 0.5 cc/g and a polymodal pore distribution with at least 80% of pore sizes in the range of 5 to 2,000 Angstroms in diameter.

A process for the production of a HS-enriched Hgas stream without the need for HS compression is disclosed. A slip stream of rich amine from a hydroprocessing unit is reduced in pressure and stripped with a hydrogen-containing gas. The HS content of the resulting gas stream can be readily controlled by adjusting the stripping pressure and/or hydrogen rate. The HS-enriched Hgas stream is suitable for the sulfidation of catalytically active metals.

Hydrogen sulfide stream for catalyst sulfidation from refinery rich amines

A process for preparing a slurry catalyst is provided. The slurry catalyst is prepared from at least a Group VIB metal precursor and optionally at least a Promoter metal precursor selected from Group VIII, Group IIB, Group IIA, Group IVA metals and combinations thereof. The slurry catalyst comprises a plurality of dispersed particles in a hydrocarbon medium having an average particle size ranging from 1 to 300 &#x3bc;m. The slurry catalyst is then mixed with a hydrogen feed at a pressure from 1435 psig (10 MPa) to 3610 psig (25 MPa) and a temperature from 200-800&#xb0; F. at 500 to 15,000 scf hydrogen per bbl of slurry catalyst for a minute to 20 hours, for the slurry catalyst to be saturated with hydrogen providing an increase of k-values in terms of HDS, HDN, and HDMCR of at least 15% compared to a slurry catalyst that is not saturated with hydrogen.

An improved process for preparing a slurry catalyst for the upgrade of heavy oil feedstock is provided. In the process, high shear mixing is employed to generate an emulsion containing droplets of metal precursor in oil with droplet sizes ranging from 0.1 to 300 &#x3bc;m. The emulsion is subsequently sulfided with a sulfiding agent, or in-situ in a heavy oil feedstock to form a slurry catalyst. The in-situ sulfidation in heavy oil is under sufficient condition for the heavy oil feedstock to generate the sulfiding source needed for the sulfidation.

An improved hydroprocessing slurry catalyst is provided for the upgrade of heavy oil feedstock. The catalyst comprises dispersed particles in a hydrocarbon medium with the dispersed particles have an average particle size ranging from 1 to 300 &#x3bc;m. The catalyst has a total pore volume of at least 0.5 cc/g and a polymodal pore distribution with at least 80% of pore sizes in the range of 5 to 2,000 Angstroms in diameter. The catalyst is prepared from sulfiding and dispersing a metal precursor solution in a hydrocarbon diluent, the metal precursor comprising at least a Primary metal precursor and optionally a Promoter metal precursor, the metal precursor solution having a pH of at least 4 and a concentration of less than 10 wt. % of Primary metal in solution.

A process for preparing a slurry catalyst for the upgrade of heavy oil feedstock is provided. The process employs a pressure leach solution obtained from a metal recovery process as part of the metal precursor feed. In one embodiment, the process comprises: sulfiding a pressure leach solution having at least a Group VIB metal precursor compound in solution forming a catalyst precursor, and mixing the sulfided catalyst precursor with a hydrocarbon diluent to form the slurry catalyst. In another embodiment, the pressure leach solution is mixed with a hydrocarbon diluent under high shear mixing conditions to form an emulsion, which emulsion can be sulfided in-situ upon contact with a heavy oil feedstock in the heavy oil upgrade process.

A method of recovering unsupported fine catalyst from heavy oil comprises combining a slurry comprising unsupported fine catalyst in heavy oil with solvent to form a combined slurry-solvent stream. The combined slurry-solvent stream is filtered in a deoiling zone. A stream comprising unsupported fine catalyst and solvent is recovered from the deoiling zone. Unsupported fine catalyst is separated from the stream comprising unsupported fine catalyst and solvent. Filtering in the deoiling zone can comprise filtering the slurry and solvent through a cross-flow microfiltration unit, recovering a retentate stream of the cross-flow microfiltration unit, combining the retentate stream of the cross-flow microfiltration unit with solvent to form a combined retentate-solvent stream, and filtering the combined retentate-solvent stream through a cross-flow microfiltration unit.

Recovery of slurry unsupported catalyst

An improved slurry catalyst feed system for heavy oil upgraded is provided. The catalyst feed system comprises a fresh slurry catalyst and a deoiled spent catalyst, with the deoiled spent catalyst being present in an amount of at least 10% the catalyst feed system. The deoiled spent catalyst is a slurry catalyst that has been used in a hydroprocessing operation resulting in than 80% but more than 10% of original catalytic activity, and containing less than 10 wt. % soluble hydrocarbons as unconverted heavy oil feed. The deoiled spent catalyst is slurried in a hydrocarbon medium as dispersed particles prior to being fed to the heavy oil upgrade system.

An improved process to make a slurry catalyst for the upgrade of heavy oil feedstock is provided. In the process, at least a metal precursor feedstock is portioned and fed in any of the stages: the promotion stage; the sulfidation stage; or the transformation stage of a water-based catalyst precursor to a slurry catalyst. In one embodiment, the promoter metal precursor feedstock is split into portions, the first portion is for the sulfiding step, the second portion is for the promotion step; and optionally the third portion is to be added to the transformation step in the mixing of the sulfided promoted catalyst precursor with a hydrocarbon diluent to form the slurry catalyst. In another embodiment, the Primary metal precursor feedstock is split into portions.

Systems and methods for hydroprocessing heavy oil feedstock is disclosed. The process employs a plurality of contacting zones and at least a separation zone to convert at least a portion of the heavy oil feedstock to lower boiling hydrocarbons, forming upgraded products. In one embodiment, water and/or steam being injected into at least a contacting zone. The contacting zones operate under hydrocracking conditions, employing at least a slurry catalyst. In one embodiment, at least a portion of the non-volatile fractions recovered from at least one of the separation zones is recycled back to at least a contacting zone ('recycled mode'). In one embodiment, the number of separation zones is less than the number of contacting zones in the system. In the separation zones, upgraded products are removed overhead and optionally treated in an in-line hydrotreater; and the bottom stream is optionally further treated in a fractionator.

Systems and methods for producing a crude product

Growing community of inventors

Martinez, CA, United States of America

Bruce Edward Reynolds