|
Diluted Bitumen
Dilbit (diluted bitumen) is a bitumen diluted with one or more lighter petroleum products, typically natural-gas condensates such as naphtha. Diluting bitumen makes it much easier to transport, for example in pipelines. Per the Alberta Oil Sands Bitumen Valuation Methodology, "Dilbit Blends" means "Blends made from heavy crudes and/or bitumens and a diluent, usually natural-gas condensate, for the purpose of meeting pipeline viscosity and density specifications, where the density of the diluent included in the blend is less than 800 kg/m3." If the diluent density is greater than or equal to 800 kg/m3, the diluent is typically synthetic crude and accordingly the blend is called synbit. Reasons for dilution Bitumen and heavy oils are often produced from remote deposits such as the Athabasca oil sands in Alberta, Canada and the Orinoco tar sands in Venezuela. Before 1980, most produced bitumen was transported by truck, but trucking is seasonally restricted and relatively i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Bitumen
Bitumen ( , ) is an immensely viscosity, viscous constituent of petroleum. Depending on its exact composition, it can be a sticky, black liquid or an apparently solid mass that behaves as a liquid over very large time scales. In American English, the material is commonly referred to as asphalt or tar. Whether found in natural deposits or refined from petroleum, the substance is classed as a pitch (resin), pitch. Prior to the 20th century, the term asphaltum was in general use. The word derives from the Ancient Greek word (), which referred to natural bitumen or pitch. The largest natural deposit of bitumen in the world is the Pitch Lake of southwest Trinidad, which is estimated to contain 10 million tons. About 70% of annual bitumen production is destined for road surface, road construction, its primary use. In this application, bitumen is used to bind construction aggregate, aggregate particles like gravel and forms a substance referred to as asphalt concrete, which is collo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Alberta Energy Company
The Alberta Energy Company Ltd. was a Canadian independent petroleum company that existed from 1973 to 2002. The AEC was created by the Government of Alberta under Premier Peter Lougheed as a mechanism for Albertans to invest in the Syncrude oil sands project. Besides its participation in Syncrude, the AEC also received the rights to produce gas in the Suffield Block. The company was established as a mixed enterprise and at its inception was half owned by the provincial Crown and half owned by the public. A restrictive charter, which prevented individual shareholders from acquiring more than one percent of the company and mandated directors be residents of Alberta, ensured control remained within the province. Until 1982, the company was barred from participation in conventional oil and gas exploration, but after that time was given the right to compete with private companies in that area. In 1983 the government began to decrease its equity, and in 1993 divested of its remaining sh ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Enbridge
Enbridge Inc. is a multinational pipeline transport, pipeline and energy company headquartered in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. Enbridge owns and operates pipelines throughout Canada and the United States, transporting crude oil, natural gas, and natural gas liquids, and also generates renewable energy. Enbridge Pipeline System, Enbridge's pipeline system is the longest in North America and the largest oil export pipeline network in the world. Its crude oil system consists of 28,661 kilometres (17,809 miles) of pipelines. Its 38,300 kilometre (23,800 mile) natural gas pipeline system connects multiple Canadian provinces, several US states, and the Gulf of Mexico. The company was formed by Imperial Oil in 1949 as the Interprovincial Pipe Line Company Limited to transport Alberta oil to refineries. Over time, it has grown through acquisition of other existing pipeline companies and the expansion of their projects. Enbridge has been responsible for several oil spills, including a spill ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Kalamazoo River Oil Spill
The Kalamazoo River oil spill occurred in July 2010 when a pipeline operated by Enbridge (Line 6B) burst and flowed into Talmadge Creek, a tributary of the Kalamazoo River near Marshall, Michigan. A break in the pipeline resulted in one of the largest inland oil spills in U.S. history (the largest was the 1991 spill near Grand Rapids, Minnesota). The pipeline carries diluted bitumen (dilbit), a heavy crude oil from Canada's Athabasca oil sands to the United States. Cleanup took five years. Following the spill, the volatile hydrocarbon diluents evaporated, leaving the heavier bitumen to sink in the water column. of the Kalamazoo River were closed for clean-up until June 2012, when portions of the river were re-opened. On March 14, 2013, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) ordered Enbridge to return to dredge portions of the river to remove submerged oil and oil-contaminated sediment. The spill On Sunday, July 25, 2010, at about 5:58 p.m. EDT, a pipe segment ruptu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
InsideClimate News
''Inside Climate News'' is a non-profit news organization, focusing on environmental journalism about the climate crisis. The publication conducts watchdog journalism on climate policy, climate misinformation, and environmental injustice.About Inside Climate News Inside Climate News. Retrieved October 7, 2024. Established in 2007, the –based organization won a Pulitzer Prize for national reporting on the Kalamazoo River oil spill in Michigan in 2013. In 2018, Inside Climate News launched the ICN Local initiative to suppo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Hydrocarbons
In organic chemistry, a hydrocarbon is an organic compound consisting entirely of hydrogen and carbon. Hydrocarbons are examples of group 14 hydrides. Hydrocarbons are generally colourless and hydrophobic; their odor is usually faint, and may be similar to that of gasoline or lighter fluid. They occur in a diverse range of molecular structures and phases: they can be gases (such as methane and propane), liquids (such as hexane and benzene), low melting solids (such as paraffin wax and naphthalene) or polymers (such as polyethylene and polystyrene). In the fossil fuel industries, ''hydrocarbon'' refers to naturally occurring petroleum, natural gas and coal, or their hydrocarbon derivatives and purified forms. Combustion of hydrocarbons is the main source of the world's energy. Petroleum is the dominant raw-material source for organic commodity chemicals such as solvents and polymers. Most anthropogenic (human-generated) emissions of greenhouse gases are either carbon dioxide ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Distillation
Distillation, also classical distillation, is the process of separating the component substances of a liquid mixture of two or more chemically discrete substances; the separation process is realized by way of the selective boiling of the mixture and the condensation of the vapors in a still. Distillation can operate over a wide range of pressures from 0.14 bar (e.g., ethylbenzene/ styrene) to nearly 21 bar (e.g., propylene/propane) and is capable of separating feeds with high volumetric flowrates and various components that cover a range of relative volatilities from only 1.17 ( o-xylene/ m-xylene) to 81.2 (water/ ethylene glycol). Distillation provides a convenient and time-tested solution to separate a diversity of chemicals in a continuous manner with high purity. However, distillation has an enormous environmental footprint, resulting in the consumption of approximately 25% of all industrial energy use. The key issue is that distillation operates based on phase changes, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Froth Treatment
Bitumen froth treatment is a process used in the Athabasca oil sands (AOS) bitumen recovery operations to remove fine inorganics—water and mineral particles—from bitumen froth, by diluting the bitumen with a light hydrocarbon solvent—either naphthenic or paraffinic—to reduce the viscosity of the froth and to remove contaminants that were not removed in previous water-based gravity recovery phases. Bitumen with a high viscosity or with too many contaminants, is not suitable for transporting through pipelines or refining. The original and conventional naphthenic froth treatment (NFT) uses a naphtha solvent with the addition of chemicals. Paraffinic Solvent Froth Treatment (PSFT), which was first used commercially in the Albian Sands in the early 2000s, results in a cleaner bitumen with lower levels of contaminates, such as water and mineral solids. Following froth treatments, bitumen can be further upgraded using "heat to produce synthetic crude oil by means of a coker unit. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
API Gravity
The American Petroleum Institute gravity, or API gravity, is a measure of how heavy or light a petroleum liquid is compared to water: if its API gravity is greater than 10, it is lighter and floats on water; if less than 10, it is heavier and sinks. API gravity is thus an inverse measure of a petroleum liquid's density relative to that of water (also known as specific gravity). It is used to compare densities of petroleum liquids. For example, if one petroleum liquid is less dense than another, it has a greater API gravity. Although API gravity is mathematically a dimensionless quantity (see the formula below), it is referred to as being in 'degrees'. API gravity is graduated in degrees on a hydrometer instrument. API gravity values of most petroleum liquids fall between 10 and 70 degrees. In 1916, the U.S. National Bureau of Standards accepted the Baumé scale, which had been developed in France in 1768, as the U.S. standard for measuring the specific gravity of liquids less den ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
National Energy Board
The National Energy Board was an independent economic regulatory agency created in 1959 by the Government of Canada to oversee "international and inter-provincial aspects of the oil, gas and electric utility industries." Its head office was located in Calgary, Alberta. The NEB mainly regulated the construction and operation of oil and natural gas pipelines crossing provincial or international borders. The Board approved pipeline traffic, tolls and tariffs under the authority of the ''National Energy Board Act''. It dealt with approximately 750 applications annually, through written or oral proceedings. The National Energy Board also had jurisdiction over the construction and operation of international power lines, defined as lines built "for the purpose of transmitting electricity from or to a place in Canada from or to a place outside of Canada." The NEB authorized imports of natural gas, and exports of crude oil, natural gas, oil, natural gas liquids (NGLs), refined petroleum ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Common Carrier
A common carrier in common law countries (corresponding to a public carrier in some civil law (legal system), civil law systems,Encyclopædia Britannica CD 2000 "Civil-law public carrier" from "carriage of goods" usually called simply a ''carrier'') is a person or company that transports goods or people for any person or company and is Legal liability, responsible for any possible loss of the goods during transport. A common carrier offers its services to the general public under license or authority provided by a regulatory body, which has usually been granted "ministerial authority" by the legislation that created it. The regulatory body may create, interpret, and enforce its regulations upon the common carrier (subject to judicial review) with independence and finality as long as it acts within the bounds of the enabling legislation. A common carrier (also called a ''public carrier'' in British English) is distinguished from a contract carrier, which is a carrier that transpor ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Synthetic Crude
Synthetic crude is the output from a bitumen/extra heavy oil upgrader facility used in connection with oil sand production. It may also refer to shale oil, an output from an oil shale pyrolysis. The properties of the synthetic crude depend on the processes used in the upgrading. Typically, it is low in sulfur and has an API gravity of around 30. It is also known as "upgraded crude". Synthetic crude is an intermediate product produced when an extra-heavy or unconventional oil source is upgraded into a transportable form. Synthetic crude is then shipped to oil refineries where it is refined into finished products. Synthetic crude may also be mixed, as a diluent, with heavy oil to create synbit. Synbit is more viscous than synthetic crude, but can also be a less expensive alternative for transporting heavy oil to a conventional refinery. Syncrude Canada, Suncor Energy Inc., and Canadian Natural Resources Limited are the three largest worldwide producers of synthetic crude with a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
