CHAPTER SIX

Concluding Remarks
F. Coletti1, G.F. Hewitt2
1
Chief Technology Ofcer, Hexxcell Ltd, UK
2
Professor of Chemical Engineering, Imperial College London, UK

As seen from Chapters 15, crude oil fouling is a highly complex process,
reecting the complex nature of crude oil itself. Crude oil composition
and behavior change from source to source, reecting the wide variety of
prehistoric events that led to the original formation of the crude oil. How-
ever, the supplier of products arising from crude oil wishes to make these
products relatively independent of the source and the crude oil distillation pro-
cess is an important tool in achieving product consistency. As demonstrated,
fouling of heat exchangers in the preheat train leads to a signicant increase
in the cost of this distillation process.
There are many types of fouling (see Chapter 2), but it seems likely that
the dominant mechanism in crude oil fouling is chemical reaction based. The
deposits are subject to important aging processes that change the physical na-
ture of the deposit with time and it is important to recognize these processes
within any meaningful model of the fouling process.
The economic importance of crude oil fouling and its formidable
complexity make it absolutely essential to continue research on this topic.
Thus, in one sense, the work presented in this book is a kind of progress
report on this research; it will be expected to continue in the future. However,
what was new in the CROF project mentioned in Chapter 1, and the associ-
ated studies which led to most of the work reported here, was the multidisci-
plinary approach in which a wide variety of skills were brought together to
attack the problem. The themes of this work can be briey sated as follows:
Experiments on fouling. Several new initiatives were taken in gath-
ering experimental data on fouling. These ranged from the use of
microbomb reactors (Chapter 3, Section 1), the development of a
rotating cell device to study fouling under controlled conditions
(Chapter 3, Section 2), the development of a novel method for fouling
layer thickness measurement (Chapter 4, Section 4), and the construction
of a major new facility for studying fouling under realistic conditions
(Chapter 3, Section 3).

Crude Oil Fouling

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322 F. Coletti and G. F. Hewitt

Characterization of fouling deposits. Here, methods were developed

that allow determination of the chemical structure and molecular weight
of deposits (Chapter 4, Section 1 and Section 2) and also allow the
location of various species on the surface of a deposit (chemical imaging,
Chapter 4, Section 3).
Modeling. Here, the modeling efforts ranged from the molecular scale in
which the determination of key parameters such as diffusion coefcients
and uid physical properties was facilitated and the development of new
equations of state that accounted for the presence of large molecules such
as asphaltenes (Chapter 5, Section 2), the modeling of the fundamental
processes of foulant deposition and aging (Chapter 5, Section 3), and the
modeling of and prediction of data from operating plants (Chapter 5,
Section 4).
This multidisciplinary effort has already brought several benets and pro-
vided useful insights in this complex eld of study. However, to give heat
transfer equipment engineers and renery operators the possibility of opti-
mizing their design and operations, it is important that the work
continues. Key areas of focus for this ongoing work are as follows:
The generation of data on fouling under conditions closely matching
those encountered in industry in apparatus such as the HIPOR facility
described in Chapter 3. Testing crude oils under controlled conditions
allows the determination of the effects that individual variables have on
the fouling behavior. The use of such equipment is essential not only
for determining the fundamental parameters governing fouling but also
for testing possible fouling mitigation strategies and technologies (e.g.,
coatings, chemicals, tube inserts).
The further development of reliable analytical techniques described in
Chapter 4 and protocols that allow the characterization of oils and
samples of deposits from both experimental testing facilities and renery
heat exchangers. Understanding what the species deposited are, espe-
cially if this can be done with in situ heating. This will help to shed light
on the underlying mechanisms dominating the fouling process.
Achieving the vision of a truly predictive multiscale model for fouling in
heat exchangers that does not rely on past data to simulate fouling
behavior as a function of crude oil composition, process conditions, and
equipment design. This means both sharpening the existing tools, pre-
sented in Chapter 5, that describe the different scales of investigation and
integrating them in a coherent framework.
Concluding Remarks 323

As a part of this multidisciplinary approach, the close collaboration

between academia and industry is a pivotal activity. Industrial experience
and practical needs should drive the overall direction of the fundamental
research. Data and deposits from the plant should be carefully analyzed to
provide actionable information for operating personnel and heat exchanger
designers that enable them to manage, mitigate, and, ideally, eliminate
fouling.
It is believed that the multidisciplinary approach described in this book
represents a paradigm shift in the approach to crude oil fouling studies,
and that it can (and should) be extended to other systems (e.g., pipelines
and upstream equipment). The problem is an ongoing one and one may
expect that research will continue!