COSTS OF REFINING SURFACE-RETORTED PARAHO SHALE OIL TO TRANSPORTATION FUELS VIA THREE REFINING SCHEMES AND SIMULATIONS OF HYDROTREATING, HYDROCRACKING, AND FLUID CATALYTIC CRACKING PROCESSES IN SHALE OIL REFINING

The costs of refining surface-retorted Paraho shale oil via grass roots refineries with three distinct, experimentally proven refining routes have been estimated in attempt to account for the additional costs due to more severe refining of shale oil relative to petroleum refining. Preliminary process designs of the shale oil specific process units in the refineries have been made on the basis of experimental data from a pilot study of shale oil refining. Based on these designs, the investment costs of shale oil specific process units were estimated with the major equipment factor method, and cost correlations were used to estimate the investment costs of other process units. Financial analyses indicate that, at a 15% rate of return on investment, the estimated refining costs are in the range of ;Yield data of advanced catalytic reaction processes in a pilot refining of Paraho shale oil have been simulated with available process models. These models are Mears' effective catalyst wetting model for whole shale oil hydrotreating, Stangeland's model for hydrocracking of 650(DEGREES)F('+) fraction of hydrotreated shale oil, and Weekman's three-lump model for catalytic cracking of 650(DEGREES)F('+) fraction of hydrotreated shale oil. These models are developed from and verified with reaction data in petroleum refining. The present simulation study was conducted to evaluate if these models are applicable for similar reaction processes in shale oil refining. Results of simulations indicate that these models predict the respective reaction yield data from the pilot refining of Paraho shale oil as reasonably well as they predict the yield data from the similar processes in petroleum refining. However, more experimental data at other operating conditions or with shale oil feeds other than the Paraho's are necessary to confirm the general applicabilities of these models for simulations of reaction processes in shale oil refining.