Mobile plant for thermally treating a contaminated or uncontaminated feed stream, processes thereof and uses of products thereof

Abstract

Mobile plant, for thermally treating a feed stream, comprising a first unit designed for heating the feed oil (Unit I); ii. a second unit comprising a rotating reactor designed to perform the thermal processing (pyrolizing) of the feed oil and a vapour solid separator (Unit II); and iii. a third unit (Unit III) that is a product separation unit and that is preferably configured for recycling at least part of the treated feed stream (heavy oil), recovered in Unit III, into Unit I. The first unit and / or the second unit is (are) configured for injecting a sweep gas in the feed oil and / or in the rotating reactor, and / or the second unit is configured in a way that the rotating reactor may work under positive pressure. The processes for thermally treating a feed material by using a mobile plant. The uses of the processes for various environmental and non-environmental applications. Processes for manufacturing the mobile plants. Uses of oil containing resins (such as cracked and / or polarized oils) for cleaning purposes and other specialty applications.

Description

FIELD OF THE INVENTION[0001]The invention relates to a mobile plant comprising a reactor for thermally treating a contaminated or uncontaminated feed stream such as a feed oil. The mobile plant may also produce oils to be used inter alia for cleaning tank bottoms for ships, tank farms and equipment fouled by heavy hydrocarbons material.[0002]The present invention also relates to a process to thermally treat used lubricating oils, waste oils, oily tank bottoms, heavy oils or bitumen in a rotating kiln operating under pressure with the injection of a gas, preferably of a sweep gas into the reactor of the mobile plant or its feed stream.[0003]The present invention also relates to the use of oils with resins, such as cracked or polarized oils, for cleaning equipment or materials that are fouled or contaminated with hydrocarbons or with other contaminants.[0004]The present invention, also relates to the use of the mobile plant for preparing specialty oils and the use of these oils in spe...

AI Technical Summary

Benefits of technology

The patent describes a mobile plant for thermally treating a feed stream. The plant includes three units: a heating / dehydration unit (Unit I), a rotating reactor for thermal processing (Unit II), and a product separation unit (Unit III). The process can also involve injecting a sweep gas and working under positive pressure. The plant can be used for cleaning fouled equipment and materials containing hydrocarbons and other fouling materials such as resins. The resulting mixture is treated and / or recycled into the process performed on the site with the mobile plant. The technical effect of this invention is a mobile plant that can effectively thermally treat a feed stream and clean fouled equipment while also recycling the treated feed stream.

Problems solved by technology

Waste oils, especially used lubricating oils (ULO), are considered a threat to the environment, and are classified as a hazardous product in most jurisdictions.

The burning of the oily residues is bad for the environment and a waste of the hydrocarbon resources.

Among the processes that regenerate ULO into lubricating oil base-stocks, some, such as the acid clay processes, were abandoned or legislated out because of the disposal costs, both financial and environmental, of the by-products such as spent acid and clays.

Because of their high capital and operating costs, these plants must be close to large population centre and / or serve a large collection area, and usually require government subsidies to be viable.

Again, these applications require extensive laboratory analyses.

The process comprises raising a temperature of a feed mixture of fresh waste oil and a recycled non-volatile residue to a range of 400 to 490 degrees Celsius for a time sufficient to cause pyrolysis of the heavy hydrocarbons contained in the feed mixture, but insufficient to permit substantial undesired polymerization, oxidation and dehydrogenation reactions to take place in the feed mixture; cooling the resulting pyrolized waste oil mixture to a temperature in the range of 300 to 425 degrees Celsius, and maintaining the temperature while allowing volatile components in the pyrolyzed waste oil mixture to evaporate, leaving a non-volatile residue containing the contaminants; condensing the evaporated volatile components to form a reclaimed oil product; and mixing the non-volatile residue with fresh waste oil to form more of the feed mixture and repeating the temperature raising, cooling, evaporation and mixing steps on a continuous basis, while continuing to condense volatile components evaporated from the pyrolyzed waste oil mixture.

Among the problems common to stationary reactors in waste oil applications are coking of the reactor walls, which impedes heat transfer from the heat source to the oil to be treated, and fouling of the equipment, not only in the reactor but also upstream and downstream of the reactor.

Indirectly fired rotating kilns are usually considered inefficient means to convey heat into a reactor.

From a practical point of view, it is difficult to ensure the integrity of the seals of both the main reactor and the coke incinerator when there is a circulating stream of solids.

When produced gas is circulated to heat the reactor feed oil to cracking temperatures, large amounts of circulating gas is required, compared to the fresh feed stream.

None of those prior art mobile plants was effectively commercialized due to several drawbacks such as not being able to treat a wide variety of waste oils, providing readily useable products with no environmentally harmful by-products.

Particularly, as mentioned in U.S. Pat. No. 4,039,130, a major problem to overcome in the construction of such a compact unit is that of providing sufficient heat in an economical manner to raise the crude oil to the temperature necessary for distillation.

Conventional salt bath, steam, and other heaters which have heretofore been used were undesirable because of their weigth, cost, and other factors.

A direct fired heater could not be used because such heaters unavoidably get hot spots which cause the tube to burn through, causing the oil being processed to bet set on fire, thereby endangering the entire plant.

None of the prior processes used cleaning oils containing a high concentration of resins (polarized hydrocarbons) as cleaning agents for fouled equipment and materials that have deposits of hydrocarbons and other materials such as asphaltenes, tars, coke, salts, dirt, gums, and resins.

Images