Partial upgrading is an emerging direction in the processing of Canadian oil sands bitumen in response to the economic and environmental challenges in the oil sands industry. Partial upgrading aims to improve bitumen quality only to the level at which pipeline specifications are met without use of diluent. Given that partial upgrading technologies have not yet reached commercial deployment, there is a lack of technical data to assess the expected benefits in terms of energy input and greenhouse gas emissions reduction. In this study, we present an assessment of a partial upgrading scheme using detailed process simulation. We developed a conceptual process scheme considering visbreaking, solvent deasphalting, and naphtha hydrotreating as the core partial upgrading processes. Reactor models were assembled using experimental data from CanmetENERGY's pilot plant facilities and from the literature and integrated into a plant‐wide simulation model. Simulations allowed the examination of trends in partial upgrader product yields and quality and enabled a comparison with traditional bitumen upgrading.

中文翻译：

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通过过程建模和仿真了解沥青的部分升级

为了应对油砂行业的经济和环境挑战，部分升级是加拿大油砂沥青加工中的新兴方向。部分升级旨在仅在不使用稀释剂的情况下将沥青质量提高到满足管道规格的水平。鉴于部分升级技术尚未达到商业部署，因此缺乏评估能源输入和减少温室气体排放方面预期收益的技术数据。在这项研究中，我们提出了使用详细过程仿真的部分升级方案的评估。我们开发了一种概念性的工艺方案，其中考虑了减粘裂化，溶剂脱沥青和石脑油加氢处理作为部分升级的核心工艺。反应堆模型是使用CanmetENERGY的试验工厂设施和文献中的实验数据组装而成的，并已集成到整个工厂的仿真模型中。仿真可以检查部分升级产品的产量和质量趋势，并可以与传统沥青升级进行比较。