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in petroleum
engineering
Desalting of
crude oil
lecture 3
desalting
• Crude oil received in a refinery contains
much water, salts, clay, and sand, which do
not settle in the tank and are desalter at the
beginning of the refining operations.
2.chemical desalter
• In this desalter chemical is added as demulsifier
in condition of crude oil stability
• Demulsifier reduces the interface between the
2 phases facilitating separation process
Types of desalter (cont.)
Both natural and chemical desalters is used
for crude with low salt content or batch
process
1.Electrochemical desalter
• This desalter is used after natural and
chemical desalters to remove the extent
of salts using electric field
Emulsion
An emulsion is a temporarily stable
mixture of immiscible fluids, such as oil
and water, achieved by finely dividing one
phase into very small droplets. Common
emulsions can be :
oil suspended in water (o/w)
water suspended in oil (w/o).
oil suspended in water (o/w)