TABLE OF CONTENTS James D. Fleshman
Foster Wheeler USA Corporation
Houston, Texas
As hydrogen use has become more widespread in refineries, hydrogen production has moved from the status of a high-technology specialty operation to an integral feature of most refineries. This has been made necessary by the increase in hydrotreating and hydrocracking, including the treatment of progressively heavier feedstocks.
Steam reforming is the dominant method for hydrogen production. This is usually combined with pressure-swing adsorption (PSA) to purify the hydrogen to greater than 99 vol %.
As hydrogen production grows, a better understanding of the capabilities and requirements of the modern hydrogen plant becomes ever more useful to the refiner. This will help the refiner get the most from existing or planned units and make the best use of hydrogen supplies in the refinery.
There has been a continual increase in refinery hydrogen demand over the last several decades. This is a result of two outside forces acting on the refining industry: environmental regulations and feedstock shortages. These are driving the refining industry to convert from distillation to conversion of petroleum. Changes in product slate, particularly outside the United States, are also important. Refiners are left with an oversupply of heavy, high-sulfur oil, and in order to make lighter, cleaner, and more salable products, they need to add hydrogen or reject carbon.
Within this trend there are many individual factors depending on location, complexity of the refinery, etc.
The early...
