GTL: An Attractive Route For Gas Monetization?

Abstract

This article, written by Technology Editor Dennis Denney, contains highlights of paper SPE 88642, "GTL: Is It an Attractive Route for Gas Monetization?," by Osama Abdul Rahman and Mohamed Al-Maslamani, SPE, Qatar Petroleum, prepared for the 2004 SPE Abu Dhabi International Petroleum Exhibition and Conference, Abu Dhabi, UAE, 10-13 October. The gas-to-liquid (GTL) conversion of natural gas into synthetic fuel is an active area of development. Many companies are involved in research, pilot plants, or demonstration units with the objective of reducing capital and operating costs of this technology. Major factors affecting the economics of the GTL process are gas price and capital cost. The GTL process could be an attractive way to monetize stranded gas reserves where the application of pipeline or liquefied-natural-gas (LNG) technology is not technically or economically feasible because the gas is either too far from a market or the gas reserves cannot support an LNG plant. Introduction The GTL process involves the conversion of natural gas into a clean source of energy, mainly diesel and naphtha. As the sulfur and aromatics specifications for diesel oil become tighter and complying with exhaust/emission requirements becomes more difficult, the GTL diesel market expands. Production of refinery diesel with ultralow sulfur content from crude oil will be expensive. The production cost of GTL diesel oil, which contains near-zero sulfur and less than 1% aromatics, will become competitive.