What is the best way of judging the efficiency of a desalter?

1. Corrosion in Desalters are the Key equipment in CDUs and does the
functions of Desalting as well as Dehdyration. There are a few
parameters that indicate the efficienty of Desalters, viz.,
Desalting efficiency, Dehydration efficiency, Brine quality, desalting
water consumption,
chemical consumption. While desalting helps minimising corrosion,
dehydration helps in
preventing fouling of down stream preheat exchangers (improve
preheat recovery and
hence minimise the Fuel consumption) and Brine quality helps in
ensuring effluent
quality in Waste water treatment facility at a low expense. Desalting is
said to be
efficient when 90% of Desalting is done in each stage (target of <1.0
PTB salt and
<500 PPM of Oil in Brine). NO water carry over into Desalted Crude is
the other
parameter that judges the desalter performance. All the above need to
be achieved
with lowest Desalting water and Chemical consumption. Remember
water is not cheap.
High oil carry over with Desalter Brine increases slops production and
hence increase
recycling costs.
2.
3. The foremost objective of the desalter is to remove inorganic salt such
as chlorides of
sodium and magnesium from the crude oil. Also it acts as a surge drum
to give
sufficient residence time to help settling of suspended particles. It
should remove all
water including micro size particles of water using the high electric
field.
Efficiency is calculated as follows: (Quantity of salt removed/Total salt
in crude before
desalter)*100.
The expected removal percentage is 95 to 98%. Removal of water can
be identified by

closely observing the variation in sour water make from atmospheric

column overhead
product drum or reflux drum.
Efficiency of desalter can be improved by adding correct quantity of
water (3 to 5% of
feed), maintaining differential pressure across the mix valve (approx
1.0kg/cm2),
desalter temperature to improve solubility and desalter operating
pressure to give
proper residence time for settling of water. Desalter temperature also
plays a role for
settling of water by reducing the viscosity of crude oil. As the settling
velocity is
inversely proportional to viscosity, it helps to settle water.
4. Very good indicators for the desalting performance are the desalting
efficiency (%) and
dehydration efficiency (%). A single stage desalter system should give
a desalting
efficiency >90%. With a double stage desalter system a desalting
efficiency >98% is
expected. The inorganic salts of NaCl, MgCl2 and CaCl2 are typically
expressed as ppm
NaCl. The desalting efficiency is calculated with this formula: Desalting
efficiency = ((ppm
NaCl in crude oil before desalter ppm NaCl in crude oil after
desalter) / ppm NaCl NaCl
in crude oil before desalter) * 100
To calculate the dehydration efficiency the amount of wash water must
be included:
Dehydration efficiency =((%water in crude oil before desalter + %wash
water to
desalter - %water in crude oil after desalter) / (%water in crude oil
before desalter + %
wash water to desalter)) * 100
5. In order to best judge the 'efficiency' of a desalting unit (whatever

efficiency means)
one compares the quality of the product with the feed, and estimates
that improvement
compared to the maximum theoretically possible. In the practical

world, one measures

the un-removed contaminants in the de-salter product stream and the
oil lost in the desalter water product. Salt content in pounds
(kilograms) per thousand barrels is a
commonly used metric. Also important is the BS&W to determine how
much dispersed
water is not being removed. Then a Karl-Fischer water analysis (ppm)
to determine the
dissolved water remaining in the processed crude is helpful.
The process objective of 'de-salting' is to:
a) remove water soluble chlorides and sulfates and any other 'salts' so
they do not
cause corrosion as they decompose and form mineral acids in the
distillation equipment
b) remove any particulates such as sand, iron oxides, clays, and any
other 'sediment'
that would accumulate on the distillation trays or packing and cause
both plugging and
corrosion under the deposits.
The goal is a perfectly 'clean' feed to the distillation equipment.
'Efficiency' can be
considered as a calculation of just how far short of perfection the unit
and operations
achieved.
One might also be concerned about the quantity of chemicals used,
electricity
consumed, pumping horsepower, water use versus theoretical
minimum for the
measured performance, hydrocarbon loss in the water effluent, total
treating cost per
barrel, etc. The BIG MONEY savings are in reducing residual salts and
sediments as
much as reasonably possible to reduce corrosion and fouling of the
equipment.