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Summary Crude Oil Quality Association Houston, TX May 29, 2003
Legal Review of Anti-Trust - Harry Giles, COQA Facilitator, reminded all attendees to review the Standard Setting Rules prior to each meeting. The Standard Setting Rules can be found on coqa-inc.org under "Information". Plains All-American Pipeline Operations - Mr. Charlie Bell, Operations Manager of Basin, explained Plains’ new organization in the Mid-Continent. Plains operations in the Mid-Continent consist of Shell’s Basin space, Shell’s WTG system (now called Plains Permian Basin system), Plains’ original WTG system and Shell’s Rancho space. Rancho Pipeline is currently shut down with no plans in the immediate future for reinstatement. Basin Pipeline now has two common streams, West Texas Intermediate and West Texas Sour. Segregated steams are also accepted. WTI is not allowed from connecting carriers at over 0.40 % sulfur and WTI at Cushing is specified at 0.42% sulfur and 37 to 42 degrees API gravity. Basin monitors sulfur and gravity but not any other crude oil quality parameters. A hard copy map of the system is available from Charlie - rcbell@paapl.com. Non-Standard Measures of Crude Oil Quality by Mr. Larry Kremer of Baker Petrolite. Crude oil assays do not predict how crude will perform in a desalter. Also, standard tests for gravity, BS&W and salt do not include all the variation in a crude quality or take into account the fact that many refineries run a blend of crude oils. Knowing more about a crude’s filterable solids and predicting its asphaltene stability may help improve desalter efficiency. Larry presented case histories where a combination of the Asphaltene Stability Indicator Test, filterable solids and a desalter simulation apparatus were used to predict problematic blends and successfully optimize blending and desalting operations. NON-STANDARD MEASURES - BAKER PETROLITE - View
this Document**** The Refinery of the Future was presented by Mr. Norman E. Duncan. The world’s present refining capacity of some 82 million barrels per day will increase in the next ten years by about 10 million barrels per day. The bulk of the increase will be in Asia reflecting its increase in consumption. Very little new is expected technologically: the refinery of the future will not be different from today’s relatively sophisticated refinery. Nevertheless, substantial upgradings will be needed in many of today’s 700+ refineries. These upgradings will result in more "white products" and less residual or "black products". Please contact the COQA facilitator for a full copy of Mr. Duncan’s presentation. Canadian Crude Quality Initiatives - Mr. Bruce Kennedy of Petro-Canada represented the Canadian Crude Quality Technical Association. The Phosphorous project group discussed the process to assist the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers (CAPP) in implementing a specification on Phosphorous. Data collection on the heavy oil S&W project is complete; the data collected will be used to reduce the impact of S&W on the refinery. New projects on measuring cracked material in crude and processing high Nap Acid crudes are in the initial stages. The additive screening project has published their final report on www.ccqta.com. A proposal has been made to standardize the General Terms and Conditions on crude oil contracts throughout the Canadian oil industry. Bill Lywood of Crude Quality Inc. asked for support from the COQA in delineating quality language to be input into the standardization. The ensuing discussion on the most important generic crude quality parameters will hopefully be of use to Bill in his quest. The monitoring program for crude oil parameters continues with results available on www.CrudeMonitor.ca. Report on the Trading Subcommittee - The Trading Subcommittee discussed education and communication of crude quality issues to the oil industry at large. A generic memo outlining he COQA’ position on contract terms covering quality issues is available. Please contact the facilitator. Report on the Communication Forum - Work is progressing on the training presentation. Three separate presentations will eventually is available; geared toward pipelines, non-technical, and refining. We are currently concentrating on the pipeline segment. These presentations are intended to be used by a quality professional to educate colleagues in the oil industry on what crude oil quality is, why it is important and how we can all benefit from it. The presentations should be clear enough that even non-quality personnel could use them for training. For your information – the Communication Task Force consists of: COQA Web Site and Budget Report - The facilitator presented the financial report for the first four months of 2003. Many thanks to our 2003 Financial Supporters: Associate Members: BakerPetrolite, Giant Refining, ITS Caleb Brett, Ondeo Nalco Energy Services, Saybolt / Core Labs, US DOE Funding members: BP Amoco, BHP Petroleum, Conoco Phillips, Gary Williams, LOOP, Marathon Ashland, Navajo, NCRA, Shell Pipeline Please review past minutes (with detailed attachments), our Retrospective Review and Mission Statement and a complete membership listing (name, company, email, phone) on coqa-inc.org. All members are encouraged to take advantage of our forum page. Next Meeting - The next meeting will be held in Houston on October 2, 2003. Harry Giles, COQA Facilitator | |