Froth Treatment

For an oil sands Customer, pressure control in the froth settling units was oscillatory and disturbances to these vessels would easily destabilize pressure controls, causing pressure spikes. As a consequence, vapour recovery compressors frequently had to compress more vapour than they were designed for, and excess vapour, composed of expensive hydrocarbons and solvent vapour, was sent to the flare stack. Spartan conducted a complete mass/energy input-output analysis and determined the largest source of disturbance was caused by unstable pressure controllers in the froth settling units. These controllers were retuned, resulting in savings of over $8.5 million and a reduction of 69,000t total CO2e to date.