Direct Processing of Crude Oil

“The key to your universe is that you can choose.”  Frederick (Carl) Frieseke (American born French Painter, 1874-1939)

According to Bloomberg News, “Saudi Arabian Oil Co. and Saudi Basic Industries Corp. are one step closer to building their first plant to process crude directly into chemicals, cutting out a costly intermediate link in the production of plastics.”

In the conventional approach, oil companies refine crude oil into transportation fuels.  The byproducts are then used by the petrochemical industry to produce chemicals.

Processing crude directly into chemicals is a more efficient route to plastics production, significantly reducing costs.

Read the complete article by clicking the link below.

Source:  Aramco, Sabic One Step Closer to Turning Oil into Chemicals, Bloomberg News, June 28, 2016 (http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-06-28/saudi-aramco-sabic-one-step-closer-to-turn-oil-into-chemicals)
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TIP: Add value to the Bloomberg article by searching Saudi Aramco patents ...

In the USPTO Patent Database (http://appft.uspto.gov/netahtml/PTO/search-bool.html) search Saudi in the Assignee Name field and integrated in All Fields. Advanced users can enter the following search string directly …

AN/saudi AND integrated
NOTE: Aramco is not a good key word for the Assignee Name field to identify Saudi Aramco patents. Use Saudi instead

One result …

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Integrated hydrotreating, solvent deasphalting and steam pyrolysis process for direct processing of a crude oil
United States Patent  9,382,486
Bourane ,   et al.   July 5, 2016
Assignee: Saudi Arabian Oil Company
Abstract
A process is provided that is directed to a steam pyrolysis zone integrated with a hydrotreating zone and a solvent deasphalting zone to permit direct processing of crude oil feedstocks to produce petrochemicals including olefins and aromatics. The integrated hydrotreating, solvent deasphalting and steam pyrolysis process comprises charging the crude oil to a hydroprocessing zone to produce a hydroprocessed effluent; charging the hydroprocessed effluent to a solvent deasphalting zone to produce a deasphalted and demetalized oil stream and a bottom asphalt phase; thermally cracking the deasphalted and demetalized oil stream in the presence of steam to produce a mixed product stream; separating the mixed product stream; purifying hydrogen recovered from the mixed product stream and recycling it to the hydroprocessing zone; recovering olefins and aromatics from the separated mixed product stream; and recovering pyrolysis fuel oil from the separated mixed product stream.
source: http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=HITOFF&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsearch-bool.html&r=1&f=G&l=50&co1=AND&d=PTXT&s1=saudi.ASNM.&s2=integrated&OS=AN/saudi+AND+integrated&RS=AN/saudi+AND+integrated
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