Novel Ebullated Bed Residue Hydrocracking Process

Abstract

Residue hydrocracking has been attracting more and more attention to the refining industry in recent years, and one of the best approaches is ebullated bed residue hydrocracking (EBRH). STRONG ebullated bed residue hydrocracking uses a new type of reactor, and a 50 KTA demonstration unit has been put into operation now. Crucial points of STRONG residue hydrocracking are proposed physical and chemical properties of a solid catalyst, flow mechanism, efficient separation of gas–liquid–solid in the reactor, and reaction performance within various scales of the pilot tests. The results showed that the STRONG reactor with a microspherical catalyst inside a canceled recycling pump inside and outside overcame mass transfer difficulties, solved diffusion control problems, and created high catalyst efficiency to reduce catalyst consumption. To prevent the catalyst from being entrained from the reactor, a triphase separator was used and the amount of catalyst carried off was less than 1 μg/g.