Prediction of product distribution in the delayed coking of Iranian vacuum residue

The delayed Coker process as an upgrading process has main impact on the productivity of the Refinery Complexes. To determine the impact of different operating conditions on the product yield distribution of the delayed coking process, several experiments were designed and conducted in a prefabricated pilot plant. The experiments were conducted on different Iranian vacuum residues at temperatures ranging from 420°C to 480°C and at atmospheric pressure. Reaction times were within the range of 5-120 minutes. A four lumps kinetic model has been developed based on the experimental results. The lumps—which included Volatile products, coke, feed, and an intermediate phase between coke and feed—were defined to precisely monitor the yield distribution of products throughout the reaction time. The feedstocks utilized were three different vacuum residues and their blends. The mixtures were produced by using different mixing ratios of the three vacuum residues. The Statistical analysis shows that this model has R-squared, RMSE, SSE, and MRE equal to 0.99, 0.022, 0.08, and 3.537%, respectively. This shows that the developed model is sufficiently accurate. The experimental and modeling results in this research reveal that by increasing the temperature, the yield of coke and gas is abated. However, the yield of the distillate is escalated. This investigation illustrates that the production of an intermediate reaction has the highest amount of activation energy in comparison with the other reactions. Also, the results indicate that the production reaction rate of coke has the highest amount in comparison with other reactions.