Petroleum Refining Industry Study 121 August 1996 Lube Dewaxing Processes Lube feedstocks typically contain increased

wax content resulting from deasphalt ing and refining processes. These waxes are normally solid at ambient temperatures and must be removed to manufacture lube oil products with the necessary low temperature prop erties. Catalytic dewaxing and solvent dewaxing (the most prevalent) are processes curre ntly in use; older technologies include cold settling, pressure filtration, and centrifuge de waxing. Catalytic Dewaxing: Because solvent dewaxing is relatively expensive for the production of low pour point oils, various catalytic dewaxing (selective hydroc racking) processes have been developed for the manufacture of lube oil base stocks. The basic process consists of a reactor containing a proprietary dewaxing catalyst followed by a s econd reactor containing a hydrogen finishing catalyst to saturate olefins created by the dewa xing reaction and to improve stability, color and demulsibility of the finished lube oil. Solvent Dewaxing: Solvent dewaxing consists of the following steps: crystalliza tion, filtration, and solvent recovery. In the crystallization step, the feedstock is diluted with the solvent and chilled, solidifying the wax components. The filtration step remove s the wax from the solution of dewaxed oil and solvent. Solvent recovery removes the solvent f rom the wax cake and filtrate for recycle by flash distillation and stripping. The major pr ocesses in use today are the ketone dewaxing processes. Other processes that are used to a lesser de gree include the Di/Me Process and the propane dewaxing process. The most widely used ketone processes are the Texaco Solvent Dewaxing Process an d the Exxon Dilchill Process. Both processes consist of diluting the waxy feedsto ck with solvent while chilling at a controlled rate to produce a slurry. The slurry is filtered using rotary vacuum filters and the wax cake is washed with cold solvent. The filtrate is used to p rechill the feedstock and solvent mixture. The primary wax cake is diluted with additional solvent and filtered again to reduce the oil content in the wax. The solvent recovered from the dewaxed oil and wax cake by flash vaporization and recycled back into the process. The Texa co Solvent Dewaxing Process (also called the MEK process) uses a mixture of MEK and toluene as the dewaxing solvent, and sometimes uses mixtures of other ketones and aromatic solv ents. The Exxon Dilchill Dewaxing Process uses a direct cold solvent dilution-chilling pro cess in a special crystallizer in place of the scraped surface exchangers used in the Texaco proc ess. The Di/Me Dewaxing Process uses a mixture of dichloroethane and methylene dichlo ride

as the dewaxing solvent. This process is used by a few refineries in Europe. T he Propane Dewaxing Process is essentially the same as the ketone process except for the fo llowing: propane is used as the dewaxing solvent and higher pressure equipment is require d, and chilling is done in evaporative chillers by vaporizing a portion of the dewaxing solvent. Although this process generates a better product and does not require crystallizers, the tempe rature differential between the dewaxed oil and the filtration temperature is higher than for the ke tone processes (higher energy costs), and dewaxing aids are required to get good filtration rat es.