More on Refining: Distillation Curves

Last week, I pointed out that the crude oil that comes out of the ground is not made up of a single hydrocarbon, but rather is a mix of different hydrocarbons that have to be separated. And oils from different parts of the world are formed as different combinations of these, and even those from the same country have different properties .

Today I would like to go a little further and talk about distillation curves. And then, because the world supply is changing to heavier crudes, I will go on to explain a little bit about what is involved in cracking a crude . It is a little more immediately relevant than some posts given that researchers at Purdue have just come out with a suggestion for an improved refining sequence that they claim could improve efficiency by between 6% and 48% depending on how the process sequences in the refinery are re-ordered. And the crude doesn