Tatneft prepared to replicate domestic hydroconversion unit

KAZAN. Aug 26 (Interfax) - Tatneft has fully tested domestic technology for processing heavy residual oil using a pilot hydroconversion unit and is prepared to replicate it, a spokesman for the oil company told Tatarstan leader and Tatneft board chairman Rustam Minnikhanov at the TatOilExpo exhibition in Kazan.

"The company [Tatneft] has its own technology for processing heavy still bottoms. This is the hydroconversion process. It is a direct competitor of processes such as Chevron's, EBR and UOP and surpasses them in terms of the conversion rate. We have now fully tested the technology and are ready to replicate it," the spokesman said.

He said the "equipment is completely domestic and the catalyst is also domestic."

Tatneft is prepared to replicate the technology of a hydroconversion unit with capacity of 50,000 tonnes per year with a conversion rate of up to 93% that uses the domestic catalyst ammonium heptamolybdate, according to the spokesman's presentation.

It was reported earlier that in 2022 Tatneft transferred a hydroconversion unit worth 8.4 billion rubles to the books of its Taneco refinery. The unit uses hydroconversion technology developed by the Russian Academy of Sciences, a process for deep conversion of heavy oil residue and heavy crude into motor fuel and feedstock for petrochemicals.

Tatar news agency Devon reported in July 2022 that the unit will produce unstable gasoline, which is then sent to the naphtha hydrotreatment unit to make Euro-6 gasoline; diesel fraction, which is sent to the diesel fuel hyrotreatment unit; vacuum gas oil, which is sent to the thermal hydrocracking unit; and vacuum residue, which is sent to the delayed coking unit.