(202a) Flaring Minimization to Reduce Fuel Consumption - 2 Case Studies in Tabriz Petroleum Refinery and Khangiran Gas Refinery

Flaring is a common method of disposal of flammable waste gases in the upstream facilities, downstream refining, and petrochemical processing industries. During recent years in Iran, all of projects have included collection of associated gases, and flare gas recovery in oil and gas refineries has been neglected. Therefore we try to investigate the operational conditions of 11 important refineries and petrochemical plants at University of Tehran. After the comprehensive evaluations, we advised the practical methods to reduce, recover and reuse flare gases for each petroleum refinery, natural gas refinery and petrochemical plants. Adequate process evaluation of plants especially units that produce flare gases, comprehensive monitoring of flow and composition of flare gases, investigation of existing flare systems and finding alternative choices to reuse flare gases have been done in 11 petroleum refineries, natural gas refineries and petrochemical plants.

This paper presents two case studies of reducing, recovery and reusing flare gases in Tabriz petroleum refinery and Khangiran gas refinery. Expected results, system operation and control, design guidelines and economics of the process have been discussed. Flare gases are compressed and returned to fuel gas header for immediate use as fuel gas. Flare gas recovery system can reduce flaring noise, operating and maintenance cost, air pollution and emission, fuel gas and steam consumption while increase process stability and flare tip life without any impact on existing safety relief system.