PETROBRAS in-house process simulator as a strategic advantage Renato A. Barbosa PETROBRAS/CENPES
PETROBRAS Operates in oil and gas production and refining, products distribution, petrochemicals and biofuels production, fertilizers, electric energy More than 100 production platforms, 15 refineries Our proved reserves are around 16 billion barrels of oil
United Kingdom Mexico USA Colombia Ecuador Peru New York Houston Venezuela BRAZIL Portugal Turkey Jordan Libya Iran Pakistan Senegal Nigeria India Tanzania Angola Mozambique Singapore Beijing Tokyo Okinawa Bolivia Rio de Janeiro Paraguay Uruguay Argentina Head Office Representative Offices Downstream Trading Upstream Areas of concentration Gross Income 2011 US$ 145.9 billions
CENPES CENPES Expansion CENPES Original Facilities Biggest research center in Latin America Leopoldo Américo Miguez de Mello Research and Development Center Copyright by Petróleo Brasileiro S/A Activities R&D Basic Engineering Technology management
Basic Engineering Activities Conceptual Project Basic Project Technical Assistance Development of New Technologies Areas of expertise Offshore and Onshore Production Sites Offshore and Onshore Facilities Offshore Structures Biodiesel unit of Montes Claros Onshore processing units for E&P, Downstream, Gas & Power and Subsidiaries
Advantages of owning an in-house process simulator Customization Knowledge sharing Standardization Easy access to the entire company
PETROX Timeline 1987: Acquisition of PSPE Simulation Program for Stationary Processes from Rio de Janeiro Federal University (COPPE/UFRJ) (Castier, 1985) 1993: First PETROX release 2013: Version 3.4
PETROX - Characteristics Steady-state Sequential modular approach Cloud network platform User-friendly interface, with graphic flowsheet
PETROX - Structure interface Command line or Simulation Engine Data bank Exported files text report Spreadsheet report
PETROX - Characteristics Pure components data bank: properties of 760 components Thermodynamic models Equations of state: SRK, PR, CPA Activity coefficient models Special models: sour water, gas sweetening (amines) Methods for property estimation Hydrates Distillation curves Fuel properties: flash point, wheatering...
PETROX - Characteristics Unit operation models Flash drum Distillation column Heat exchanger Compressor Conversion units Membrane Pipe Special modules: controller, calculator Reactors
PETROX Customized features Data bank containing 2060 national and international oils, containing assays measured by PETROBRAS or acquired from suppliers Correlations specifically developed to estimate properties of heavy oils Conversion models Fluid catalitic cracking Delayed coking Hydrotreating reactor Mild thermal cracking Sulfur recovery unit Shale retort unit
PETROX Customized features Integration with other softwares Rigorous heat exchanger simulation (HTRI) Furnace simulator CAE systems Heat exchanger network design Real time applications
PETROX - Applications Revamp and design of new units Refining units Natural gas processing Basic petrochemicals production Offshore production facilities Fertilizer units Treating units Operation analysis and optimization
PETROX - Applications Real time applications - PETROX TR Virtual analyser: inference of indirect properties using directly measured properties Composition LPG Wheatering Fouling TR (Liporace et al, 2007) Software developed by CENPES, for real-time monitoring of preheat trains.
PETROX - New features being developed Adequation to CAPE-OPEN protocol Improve HTRI integration (new exchanger model) Improve integration New rigorous gas sweetening model
References Castier, M., 1985, Desenvolvimento de um programa executivo para a simulação de processos químicos, M. Sc. Dissertation Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro, COPPE, Programa de Engenharia Química, 239 p. Liporace, F. S., Oliveira, S. G., 2007, Heat Transf. Eng., Vol 28, pp193-201. Niederberger, J., Gama, M. S., dos Santos, L. C., da Silva, J. A., Vargas, C. E., Ahón, V. R. R., Silva, E. P., Souza, D. F. de S., Aquino, C. A. dos S., Aires, J. S. S., 2009, 10th International Symposium on Process Systems Engineering PSE2009.