Degassing and vapor control equipment becomes more advanced with each passing year in the petrochemical industry. Depending on the application, vapor incinerators have slowly been replaced by thermal oxidizers. Even more recently and also depending on the application, thermal oxidizers have been replaced by enclosed flare technology. This development has led to devices that can combust concentrated hydrocarbon vapor streams with lower emissions than ever before. Some emission testing facilities have given 100-percent destruction rate efficiency ratings to newer enclosed flare units.
As with mobile thermal oxidizers and mobile vapor incinerators, mobile-enclosed flares come in several sizes, depending on the customer’s needs. The mobility of the enclosed flare is critical, because the customer only needs it for maintenance work and not year-round operations. The most common size and configuration of a mobile device is 42 million British thermal units per hour (MMBtu/hr), which can be used for truck loading racks, barge loading, hydrogen blowdowns for process unit turnarounds, pipeline blowdowns and oilfield vapor recovery. Several vapor control providers are now producing 20-MMBtu/hr enclosed flares for smaller jobs. The most innovative companies have engineered the pinnacle of mobile-enclosed flare technology: 70-MMBtu/hr units. These new 70-MMBtu/hr enclosed flares are incredibly versatile and are so massive they barely fit on the longest DOT-legal trailers.
When selecting a vendor to provide a temporary enclosed flare for your upcoming maintenance activities, be sure to keep safety in mind. How do the vendors’ safety records compare? An excellent safety record may be an indicator of well-engineered control systems. A well-designed control system is designed to shut down in the case of any upset condition on board. In addition, your vendor’s engineering staff can tie your facility’s emergency shutdown and permissive systems into the enclosed flare’s controls, providing an extra level of security for your critical operations.
An additional indicator of true expertise in enclosed flare technology is low emission rates. Can your vendor meet your local/state best-available control technology and permit requirements? If not, they could be costing you much more, following the project with fines and a notice of violations from your local/state regulatory district. An excellent vendor will provide detailed testing results from each piece of equipment to prove compliance with your requirements. A competent vendor will also have an engineering staff that can translate and communicate the often convoluted emission measurement and reporting requirements.
Oftentimes, service providers are not also equipment manufacturers. This leads to lengthy and circuitous maintenance cycles, which often result in delayed timelines, over-budget projects and customer frustration. A degassing and vapor control provider that designs and fabricates its own degassing equipment will give you much better results when — not if — unplanned maintenance issues arise. They have the personnel who built the equipment from the ground up and are more than capable of fixing any issue in no time. These vendors understand the theory of operation to isolate the problem and have the spare parts required to replace any malfunctioning component on-site. This provides the customer a more efficient means of correcting the situation than having to replace an entire oxidizer, which can take much longer.
Premier vapor control vendors will be able to provide each of these benefits to your operation: multiple sizes of equipment to suit your specific need, with a range from 20 MMBtu/hr to 70 MMBtu/hr, impressive safety statistics based on well-engineered control systems, thorough regulatory compliance capabilities and an in-house fabrication facility. Degassing and vapor control are serious operations. Be sure your vendor is up to the task.
For more information, contact Willie Lule at (888) 997-9465 or willie.lule@envent.net.