Oil and Gas
The petroleum industry, also known as the oil industry or the oil patch, includes the global processes of exploration, extraction, refining, transporting (often by oil tankers and pipelines), and marketing of petroleum products. The largest volume products of the industry are fuel oil and gasoline (petrol). Petroleum (oil) is also the raw material for many chemical products, including pharmaceuticals, solvents, fertilizers, pesticides, synthetic fragrances, and plastics. The extreme monetary value of oil and its products has led to it being known as "black gold". The industry is usually divided into three major components: upstream, midstream, and downstream.
Petroleum is vital to many industries, and is necessary for the maintenance of industrial civilization in its current configuration, making it a critical concern for many nations. Oil accounts for a large percentage of the world’s energy consumption, ranging from a low of 32% for Europe and Asia, to a high of 53% for the Middle East.
Other geographic regions' consumption patterns are as follows: South and Central America (44%), Africa (41%), and North America (40%). The world consumes 30 billion barrels (4.8 km³) of oil per year, with developed nations being the largest consumers. The United States consumed 25% of the oil produced in 2007. The production, distribution, refining, and retailing of petroleum taken as a whole represents the world's largest industry in terms of dollar value.
Crude oil (BLCO)
Bonny Light oil is a high grade of Nigerian crude oil with high API gravity (low specific gravity), produced in the Niger Delta basin and named after the prolific region around the city of Bonny. The very low sulfur content of Bonny Light crude makes it a highly desired grade for its low corrosiveness to refinery infrastructure and the lower environmental impact of its byproducts in refinery effluent. Other grades of Nigerian crude oil are Qua Iboe crude oil, Brass River crude oil, and Forcados crude oil. The Cabinda crude oil is a common grade of crude oil produced in Angola. The Bonny Light is in high demand specifically by American and European refineries. It is therefore a major source of income for the oil-rich nation.
REBCO GOST 9965-76, URALS
Urals oil is a reference oil brand used as a basis for pricing of the Russian export oil mixture. It is a mix of heavy sour oil of Urals and the Volga region with light oil of Western Siberia. Other reference oils are Brent, West Texas Intermediate and Dubai. Urals brand oil is supplied through the Baku-Novorossiysk pipeline system and the Druzhba pipeline. Urals oil futures trade on Russian Trading System stock exchange.
Diesel supply AGO, D2 AND D6
Diesel is made of a blend of crude oil components called hydrocarbons. The components for making this fuel are refined out of crude oil, usually by fractionated distillation. Though it's often used for similar purposes to those of gasoline, it burns differently, and so needs a different type of engine to work. Additionally, although diesel is heavier and less volatile than gasoline, it is often more efficient, especially with heavy loads.
Types of Diesel Fuel
1) AGO (Automotive Gas Oil): The Automotive Gas Oil, or AGO, is the name given to fuel intended for use in road vehicles (trucks, buses, vans and cars) powered by diesel engines. The name AGO is used to refer to the NNPC grade of diesel/gas oil. AGO is used in two main types of vehicle:
I. Heavy-duty vehicles, such as trucks and buses.
II. Light-duty vehicles, such as vans and passenger cars.
2) D2: D2 diesel, also called Gasoil, is a fuel oil that is the second distillate derived from crude oil. D2 diesel products contain different levels of sulfur and require no reformers or additives to produce. It could also be Automotive Gas Oil (AGO).
3) D6: Diesel Fuel Oil (D6) is also be known as Residual Fuel Oil and is of high-viscosity. The D6 is mostly used for generators.
Kerosene DPK
Dual purpose kerosene can be used as aviation fuel (JET A-1), and as cooking and Lighting oil (Illuminating Kerosene –IK) hence its name dual purpose kerosene.
DPK is a very versatile product. When in a very pure state and is used to power jet engine aircraft (jet-fuel) and some rockets, it is known as Aviation Turbine Kerosene (ATK). It is also used as domestic fuel for lamps, stoves, cookers.
Kerosene is still the most popular cooking oil used in the country because it is relatively affordable and not highly combustible. Also widely used as a solvent in industries. Illuminating Kerosene sold in Kenya must meet critical KEBS standards shown below;
• Must have a density @ 20 degrees centigrade Kg/m3 of 817 maximum
• Sulfur content of 0.15% maximum.
Jet / Aviation Fuel (JP54 & Jet A1)
Jet A1 aviation jet fuel is produced for the international markets. Jet A1 aviation jet fuel as a standard spec has a free point of -47 C. of which is allowed to be utilized in cold weather environments.
Jet A aviation jet fuel is produced primarily for the USA market. Jet A aviation jet fuel as a standard spec has a free point of -40 C. of which is allowed to be utilized exclusively in the USA. The most commonly used fuels for commercial aviation are Jet A and Jet A-1, which are produced to a standardized international specification. The only other jet fuel commonly used in civilian turbine-engine powered aviation is Jet B, which is used for its enhanced cold-weather performance.
Russian JP54 is an abbreviation for “Jet Propulsion, A1, Colonial Grade 54″. During the refining process only 15% of the crude oil is made up of JP54 the rest of the grade is used for different types of plastic. Developed by JP Morgan, Colonial grade JP54 was replaced by AVGAS also known as AVGAS100LL.
Actually most jet fuel exported from Russia is “JP54” or “Colonial JP54”. It is similar to “Jet A” except the the Specific Energy is 18.4 mj/kg compared to that of 42.8 mj/kg of “Jet A”.
Low Pour Fuel Oil (LPFO)
This product, popularly known in Nigeria as BLACK OIL, is one of the products in the fractional distillation of crude oil. Low Pour Fuel Oil is made of long hydrocarbon chains, particularly aromatics, alkanes and cycloalkanes. LPFO is used to run boilers in many industries especially textile and cement manufacturing industries. It is more effective and efficient than D2 – AGO. It also results in lower carbon monoxide production. LPFO is a dark vicious liquid and may have many other varying colors such as dark brown, known locally as fire for fire to the greenish appearance as produced in the Kaduna refinery in Nigeria. Whatever the specification, product may be supplied depending on the buyer’s preference.
The different grades of fuel oil depend on their volatility and degree with which they burn. Nigerian LPFO is of a higher quality and it is the reason for the increase in demand by American refineries and most of the European countries.
Liquefied Petroleum Gas Supply (LPG)
Liquefied petroleum gas or liquid petroleum gas (LPG or LP gas), also referred to as simply propane or butane, are flammable mixtures of hydrocarbon gases used as fuel in heating appliances, cooking equipment, and vehicles. It is increasingly used as an aerosol propellantand a refrigerant, replacing chlorofluorocarbons in an effort to reduce damage to the ozone layer. When specifically used as a vehicle fuel it is often referred to as autogas.
Varieties of LPG bought and sold include mixes that are mostly propane (C3H8), mostly butane (C4H 10), and, most commonly, mixes including both propane and butane. In the northern hemisphere winter, the mixes contain more propane, while in summer, they contain more butane.
Propylene, butylenes and various other hydrocarbons are usually also present in small concentrations. HD-5 limits the amount of propylene that can be placed in LPG to 5%, and is utilized as an autogas specification. A powerful odorant, ethanethiol, is added so that leaks can be detected easily.
LPG is prepared by refining petroleum or "wet" natural gas, and is almost entirely derived from fossil fuel sources, being manufactured during the refining of petroleum (crude oil), or extracted from petroleum or natural gas streams as they emerge from the ground.
Mazut M100
Mazut is a heavy, low quality fuel oil, used in generating plants and similar applications. In the United States and Western Europe, mazut is blended or broken down, with the end product being diesel. Mazut may be used for heating houses in the former USSR and in countries of the Far East that do not have the facilities to blend or break it down into more conventional petro-chemicals. In the West, furnaces that burn mazut are commonly called "waste oil" heaters or "waste oil" furnaces. Mazut is almost exclusively manufactured in the Russian Federation, Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, and Turkmenistan. This product is typically used for larger boilers in producing steam since the energy value is high. The most important factor when grading this fuel is the sulfur content, which can mostly be affected by the source feedstock. For shipment purposes, this product is considered a ”dirty oil” product, and because viscosity drastically affect whether it is able to be pumped, shipping has unique requirements.
Pet Coke
Petroleum coke, abbreviated coke or petcoke, is a final carbon-rich solid material that derives from oil refining, and is one type of the group of fuels referred to as cokes. Petcoke is the coke that, in particular, derives from a final cracking process—a thermo-based chemical engineering process that splits long chain hydrocarbons of petroleum into shorter chains—that takes place in units termed coker units.(Other types of coke are derived from coal.) Stated succinctly, coke is the "carbonization product of high-boiling hydrocarbon fractions obtained in petroleum processing (heavy residues)." Petcoke is also produced in the production of synthetic crude oil (syncrude) from bitumen extracted from Canada’s oil sands and from Venezuela's Orinoco oil sands.
In petroleum coker units, residual oils from other distillation processes used in petroleum refining are treated at a high temperature and pressure leaving the petcoke after driving off gases and volatiles, and separating off remaining light and heavy oils. These processes are termed "coking processes", and most typically employ chemical engineering plant operations for the specific process of delayed coking
This coke can either be fuel grade (high in sulfur and metals) or anode grade (low in sulfur and metals). The raw coke directly out of the coker is often referred to as green coke. In this context, "green" means unprocessed. The further processing of green coke by calcining in a rotary kiln removes residual volatile hydrocarbons from the coke. The calcined petroleum coke can be further processed in an anode baking oven to produce anode coke of the desired shape and physical properties. The anodes are mainly used in the aluminium and steel industry.
Petcoke is over 80% carbon and emits 5% to 10% more carbon dioxide (CO2) than coal on a per-unit-of-energy basis when it is burned. As petcoke has a higher energy content, petcoke emits between 30 and 80 percent more CO2 than coal per unit of weight. The difference between coal and coke in CO2 production per unit of energy produced depends upon the moisture in the coal, which increases the CO2 per unit of energy – heat of combustion – and on the volatile hydrocarbons in coal and coke, which decrease the CO2 per unit of energy.
Bitumen (Asphalt)
Asphalt, also known as bitumen is a sticky, black, and highly viscous liquid or semi-solid form of petroleum. It may be found in natural deposits or may be a refined product, and is classed as a pitch. Before the 20th century, the term asphaltum was also used. The primary use (70%) of asphalt is in road construction, where it is used as the glue or binder mixed with aggregate particles to create asphalt concrete. Its other main uses are for bituminous water proofing products, including production of roofing felt and for sealing flat roofs.
The terms "asphalt" and "bitumen" are often used interchangeably to mean both natural and manufactured forms of the substance. In American English, "asphalt" (or "asphalt cement") is commonly used for a refined residue from the distillation process of selected crude oils. Outside the United States, the product is often called "bitumen", and geologists worldwide often prefer the term for the naturally occurring variety. Common colloquial usage often refers to various forms of asphalt as "tar", as in the name of the La Brea Tar Pits.
Naturally occurring asphalt is sometimes specified by the term "crude bitumen". Its viscosity is similar to that of cold molasses while the material obtained from the fractional distillation of crude oil boiling at 525 °C (977 °F) is sometimes referred to as "refined bitumen". The Canadian province of Alberta has most of the world's reserves of natural asphalt in the Athabasca oil sands, which cover 142,000 square kilometres (55,000 sq mi), an area larger than England.