A North American refining company retained MathPro Inc. to analyze the economics of a proposed capital project to expand the refinery’s capabilities for processing the residual oil fraction of crude oil. The proposed project involved installation of a ROSE™ solvent extraction unit and attendant modification and expansion of other refinery process units.

The analysis involved (i) developing a representation of the client’s refinery using MathPro’s ARMS refinery modeling system, (ii) developing and incorporating in ARMS a generalized representation of the ROSE process, and (iii) estimating the technical and economic effects of a ROSE unit in the client’s refinery, under a number of different economic scenarios and for a range of future crude slates.

The analysis delineated the critical technical factors determining the economics of the contemplated project and the market conditions under which the project could be economically attractive.