Other

Petro-canada

Gulf Canada Resources Limited

Murphy Oil Company Ltd.

Mocal Energy Limited

Imperial Oil Resources

Nexen Corporation

Aec Oil Sands, L.p.

Athabasca Oil Sands Investments, Inc.

Canadian Oil Sands Investments, Inc.

Aec Oil Sands Limited Partnership

Corey Mayr

George Cymerman

James Lorentz

Pat Dougan

Tom Tran

Tam Tran

Jim Lorenz

Patrick Dougan

Diluent-diluted bitumen froth containing bitumen and naphtha diluent, hydrocarbons, water, sand and fines (collectively &ldquo;dilfroth&rdquo;) is fed into a vapor-tight gravity settler ('splitter') and temporarily retained to produce a bottom layer of tails comprising sand and middlings, a rag layer of discrete three-dimensional structures, each comprising hydrocarbons contained in a skin of fines, and a top layer of hydrocarbons containing small droplets of water and fines ('raw dilbit'). The flux in the splitter is less than 6 m /h of dilfroth fed per m of horizontal cross-sectional rag area. The in-coming dilfroth is fed directly into the splitter middlings. Demulsifier is added to the overflow stream of raw dilbit and the mixture is subjected to prolonged settling in a vapor-tight polisher tank, to produce polished dilbit containing less than 1.0 wt. % water and 0.3 wt. % solids. The splitter underflow tails, containing less than 15 wt. % bitumen, is mixed with additional diluent to raise the diluent/bitumen ratio to 4:1 to 10:1 and is gravity settled in a vapor-tight scrubber. Scrubber overflow, mostly diluent containing residual bitumen stripped from the tails, is recycled to the splitter. In concept, the sand is first separated from the bitumen in the stripper. The substantially sand-free bitumen can then feasibly be treated with chemical demulsifier and subjected to prolonged settling in the polisher to reduce water and fines contents to low levels. Bitumen lost with the splitter tails is recovered in the scrubber using a high concentration of diluent. The scrubber overflow of bitumen and diluent is recycled to the stripper to conserve diluent.

Staged settling process for removing water and solids from oils and extraction froth

Growing community of inventors

Fort McMurray, Canada

Corey Mayr