Falling oil prices, forced cost cuts and optimization of financial flows - all these factors have had a serious impact on large energy companies.
Below are the 10 largest energy companies.
1. ExxonMobil
Country: USAMarket capitalization: $363.3 billion
Exxon became one of five major oil and gas companies included in the Fortune 500 list, despite the unfavorable environment in the global energy market in lately. Moreover, the company ranks second in the Fortune 500.
Exxon has played a huge role in defense oil and gas industry from innovations related to growing concerns about environmental damage, especially in the United States.
The New York Attorney General is currently investigating Exxon and its role in hiding the effects of oil and gas production from the public. The company, in turn, denies all accusations.
Exxon Mobil Corp - American company, the largest private oil company in the world, one of the largest corporations in the world by market capitalization.
The company produces oil in various regions of the world, including the USA, Canada, the Middle East, etc. ExxonMobil has a stake in 45 refineries in 25 countries and has a network of gas stations in more than 100 countries. Proven reserves - 22.4 billion barrels of oil equivalent
2.PetroChina
Market capitalization: $203.8 billion
PetroChina came second largest company in the world, despite the fact that it is recovering from severe financial turmoil associated with rising production costs, as well as the difficult situation in the global market.
PetroChina Co Ltd is a Chinese oil and gas company. PetroChina was created as part of the Chinese state-owned CNPC in November 1999.
As part of the restructuring of CNPC, assets in production, refining, petrochemicals and natural gas were transferred to PetroChina.
Organizational and legal form of PetroChina - joint stock company. Controlling stake PetroChina shares are owned by CNPC.
The company is engaged in the exploration, development and production of oil and natural gas, as well as the refining, transportation and distribution of oil and petroleum products, petrochemical products and the sale of natural gas.
3. Chevron
Market capitalization: $192.3 billion
Chevron Corporation is the second integrated US energy company after Exxon Mobil and one of the largest corporations in the world.
The company produces oil in various regions of the world. It owns a number of oil refineries, as well as an extensive network of gas stations. Chevron's proven oil reserves are 13 billion barrels.
Chevron's interests span all aspects of the oil and gas industry, including exploration, production, transportation and production, sales and research and development.
4. Total
Market capitalization: $121.9 billion
The French company Total is one of the companies striving to create progressive standards in the oil and gas industry.
This is primarily due to the fact that at the end of last year a summit was held in Paris with the participation of the heads of 195 countries, the main topic of which was environmental issues.
6.Royal Dutch Shell
Market capitalization: $210 billion
Royal Dutch Shell Plc is a Dutch-British oil and gas company.
Shell conducts geological exploration and production of oil and gas in more than 80 countries.
Shell also fully or partially owns more than 30 oil refineries.
Shell owns the world's largest network of gas stations, which has more than 43 thousand stations.
In addition, Shell owns a significant amount chemical enterprises, as well as production solar panels and others alternative sources energy.
7. Gazprom
Market capitalization: $57.1 billion
Gazprom is a Russian transnational corporation engaged in geological exploration, production, transportation, storage, processing and sales of gas, gas condensate and oil, as well as the production and sale of heat and electricity.
Gazprom has the world's richest natural gas reserves. Its share in world gas reserves is 17%, in Russian - 72%.
Gazprom accounts for 11% of global and 66% of Russian gas production.
Currently, the company is actively implementing large-scale projects to develop gas resources of the Yamal Peninsula, the Arctic shelf, Eastern Siberia and Far East, as well as a number of hydrocarbon exploration and production projects abroad.
8. Rosneft
Market capitalization: $51.1 billion
Rosneft is the leader of the Russian oil industry and the largest public oil and gas corporation in the world.
The main activities of OJSC NK Rosneft are the search and exploration of hydrocarbon deposits, the production of oil, gas, gas condensate, the implementation of projects for the development of offshore fields, the processing of extracted raw materials, the sale of oil, gas and their processed products in Russia and abroad. .
9. Reliance Industries
Market capitalization: $50.6 billion
Reliance Industries Ltd is an Indian company, the country's largest holding company. The company is headquartered in Navi Mumbai, a satellite city of Mumbai.
The company's main business is concentrated in the field of oil and gas production, as well as oil refining (it owns a large oil refining complex in Jamnagar, Gujarat) - these industries are engaged in subsidiary Reliance Petroleum.
In addition, Reliance Industries owns large petrochemical capacities and is also prominent in the Indian market retail network(for trade in products, electronics, and many others).
10. "LUKoil"
Market capitalization: $36.8 billion
LUKoil is a Russian oil company. The main activities of the company are exploration, production and processing of oil and natural gas, sales of oil and petroleum products.
More than half of LUKoil's oil reserves are concentrated in Western Siberia(the main production operator is LUKoil-Western Siberia LLC (located in Khanty-Mansiysk Autonomous Okrug), 100% of whose shares belong to OJSC LUKoil and is largest asset"LUKoil").
The quality of gasoline and diesel fuel worries all car owners. Meanwhile, the times of “left-handed” gasoline are becoming a thing of the past. The reason for this is the rapid re-equipment of Russian refineries to produce lighter hydrocarbons or simply motor fuel. Where are those refineries that produce the highest quality fuel located?
The Russian oil refining industry is one of the largest in the world. In terms of total oil refining volume, Russia is among the top five world leaders, second only to the United States and China. Russia inherited this place from the USSR since all the largest oil refineries were built before 1991. Now Russian oil refining unites more than 30 large plants with processing volumes of more than 1 million tons of oil per year and several dozen small ones.
Here are the largest of them:
Russian leader, owned by Gazprom Neft. Processing volume - 20.9 million tons crude oil per year, processing depth 88.8%. Area - 24 sq. km. The plant was launched in 1955, and from 2008 to 2015 a large-scale reconstruction was carried out, which made it possible to switch to the production of motor fuels of the Euro-5 environmental class and significantly increase energy efficiency and environmental friendliness. Taking into account the beginning of the second stage of modernization, which will be completed in 2020, in 4 years the depth of oil refining will be 97%, a record even for world indicators, and the plant will be able to produce motor fuels of the Euro-6 environmental class.
The plant began implementing a project in 2016, according to which by 2020 it is planned to create a high-tech complex for the production of catalysts for catalytic cracking. This project is so relevant for the industry that the Ministry of Energy awarded it the status of “National”. When the project is implemented, mass production of catalysts for creating fuels of Euro-5 and higher standards will begin in Russia.
KINEF
An oil refinery located in the north of our country in Leningrad region in Kirishi, group-owned"SurgutNefteGaz". The refining volume is 20.5 million tons of oil per year, the refining depth is 59.6%. The history of the plant dates back to 1966, and since 1974 the plant began producing raw materials for petrochemicals: benzene, toluene, isopentane, normal pentane and butane, nephras. In 1981, a catalytic reforming unit was launched, capable of processing up to a million tons of raw materials per year, and in 1988, hydrotreating of diesel fuels was implemented, with a capacity of two million tons per year.
KINEF - largest supplier diesel fuel to Europe.
Ryazan NPK
The largest oil refinery in the European part of Russia. The enterprise belongs to the Rosneft company and processes 18.8 million tons of crude oil per year. Processing depth 68.6%. The plant's product range is quite wide: motor gasoline, diesel fuel, jet fuel, boiler fuel, bitumen.
The company began operating in 1960. An environmental research center began operating at the enterprise in 2014. There are also five environmental laboratories. Measurements of harmful emissions have been carried out since 1961.
Yaroslavl Oil Refinery
The Novo-Yaroslavl oil refinery, owned by Gazprom Neft and Rosneft, began operating in 1961. Today, its processing volume is 15.3 million crude oil per year, the processing depth is 65.7%. The plant produces motor gasoline, diesel fuel, jet fuel, oils, bitumen, waxes, paraffins, aromatic hydrocarbons, fuel oil, and liquefied gas. The amount of previously accumulated waste decreased by 3.5 times, and the volume of polluting emissions into the atmosphere decreased by 1.4 times.
The Moscow Oil Refinery, owned by Gazprom Neft, is the oldest enterprise in the industry. It was put into operation in 1938. Today the plant's capacity is 12.6 million tons of crude oil per year, the processing depth is 75%. Despite such capacity, the plant satisfies only about 40% of the capital’s fuel needs. Hence the plant's specialization - light petroleum products: gasoline, diesel fuel. Additionally, bitumen, fuel oil and liquefied natural gas are produced. All high-octane gasoline and diesel fuel produced by the Moscow Refinery comply with the Euro-5 environmental standard.
Due to the fact that the plant is located within the city, the enterprise has implemented the most modern system environmental management.
Of course, these are not all Russian oil refineries. There are about 36 of them in total. Among them there are giants such as the Perm or Volgograd oil refineries, and there are also smaller ones that meet the needs of individual regions. By the way, the construction of small, specialized refineries is the most modern trend!
"Oil-Expo" - delivery of diesel fuel and gasoline throughout Moscow and the region.
Where every eighth liter of gasoline is produced in Russia, and what modern domestic oil refining is like - in a joint project of Kommersant and the Gazprom Neft company
The planet's need for oil increases every year. We consume more than 50 million barrels of motor fuel alone every day - in 15 years this figure will be another third higher. To see with their own eyes how oil becomes fuel, Kommersant correspondents visited the Omsk Oil Refinery, the largest in Russia and one of the largest refineries in the world.
A medium-range passenger aircraft burns about 3 tons of aviation kerosene per hour. Our airliner, a Boeing 757, flying the Moscow-Omsk route, should have already consumed more than 9 tons when I felt that we were landing.
The first thing a passenger sees when approaching the city from the west is the pipes of the Omsk power plant jutting into the sky. They become distinguishable long before the outlines of the city itself appear on the horizon, low by modern standards, located at the confluence of two rivers - the Om and Irtysh.
These places - the southern part of Western Siberia - have long been reclaimed from nature, so there are few forests here and the swamps do not darken as often as, say, in the Tyumen region. Once upon a time, when fur was a strategic resource, fur fishing was carried out here. Today Russia has a different strategic resource, and now they are engaged in oil.
Gradually descending, we approach the Omsk oil refinery. The white “washers” of the oil storage tanks seem tiny at first, but later we are told that some of the 43 storage tanks of the plant’s tank farm can contain up to 50 thousand cubic meters (this is comparable to the capacity of an Olympic swimming pool) of crude oil.
2800
employees working at the Omsk Refinery
During the time that we fly over the plant, its individual buildings and even people become visible in detail. Below me are hundreds of kilometers of pipelines laid on overpasses above the ground. Almost 3 thousand employees - engineers, operators, technologists, laboratory technicians, mechanics, drivers, adjusters. Rare cars seem to plod along, not even exceeding the maximum speed allowed at the factory of 40 km/h. Columns of oil refining units glisten in the sun.
Below me is one thirteenth of all the oil processed in Russia. The largest taxpayer in the Omsk region and the most powerful of the country's 36 oil refineries, processing 21 million tons of oil per year. If this figure in itself doesn’t mean anything to you, imagine a train consisting of tanks, each of which holds up to 60 tons of oil. If you pour all the oil arriving at the Omsk Refinery through them, you will end up with a train of 367 thousand tanks. It will stretch the distance from Omsk to Moscow. And even further.
Light sweet oil
Oil has haunted man for thousands of years. In ancient times there were places (however, they still exist) where oil itself came to the surface, oozing from underground. Its healing properties have long been discovered, as has its ability to burn. Eternal flames of gas and oil fields became altars of ancient religions. Oil was also used as a weapon. But that was before the oil era began and its main power - creation - was revealed.
Over the past 150 years, people need more and more oil every year, and it, in turn, goes deeper and hides, putting obstacles in the way of its extraction from the depths. And while geologists and drillers are trying to push oil out of the ground, people of another profession, oil refiners, are looking for new ways to reveal the secrets of this substance.
A modern refinery is a multitude of processes that involve dozens of installations and thousands of people. Not to mention millions of tons of raw materials. At the dawn of the history of refining, only fire and a copper cube were used to distill oil into any product - kerosene, fuel oil, antediluvian gasoline. Today, some processes occurring at the molecular level are so fleeting that it is time to ask the question - do they occur at all? And if earlier a cube, fire and hours of waiting gave a finished product, now with the growing needs of mankind, the process, which takes one or two seconds and takes place in a gigantic reactor, produces only one out of ten, or even fifteen components of gasoline. In order to turn oil, for example, into Euro-5 gasoline, more than ten units operate around the clock at the Omsk plant.
Once upon a time humanity burned most of processed oil without finding any use for it. Now it's luxury. Now oil refiners are fighting for every tenth, or even one hundredth of a percent. Less and less product falls into the “irreplaceable losses” column. The fuel is becoming cleaner - the billions of rubles that Gazprom Neft has already invested in the development of its plants, including Omsk, have made it possible to completely switch to the production of Euro-5 gasoline and diesel. This means that tens of times less harmful substances enter the air of Omsk, Moscow, Yaroslavl - and all cities where the company’s fuel is sold - from car exhaust pipes than before.
After completing the next stage of modernization, the goal of which is to increase production efficiency, the depth of oil refining will reach 97% by 2020. Accordingly, refining one ton of crude oil will make it possible to obtain up to 970 kg of commercial quality petroleum products - this will be a record figure for Russia.
The commodity and raw material base of the Omsk Refinery is located at the very edge of the plant territory, where its pumping station is surrounded by giant tanks, those same white “washers” that could be seen from an airplane. These are steel barrels painted white, up to 15 m high. Perhaps, of all the refinery buildings, these tanks are the most seemingly simple and familiar structures to the eye. We sometimes see them at gas stations or airports. U railways. And we never think about how they actually appeared. The structure is so elementary in the minds of the average person that it would seem that it does not deserve special attention. But its creator - a man better known to the general public as the designer of the Shabolovskaya Tower in Moscow - influenced the oil industry of Russia and the world like few others.
Russian engineer Vladimir Grigoryevich Shukhov developed the first tanks, which are still called Shukhov tanks, in 1878 for the Nobel Brothers Partnership, which was developing the Baku oil fields. Then, at the dawn of the oil era, the engineer proved that this method of storage was both the safest for the environment and the most economical to produce. Previously, oil in Russia was stored in bulk ponds, in the USA - in rectangular metal tanks. At the same time, Shukhov designed the first oil pipeline in Russia - Baku-Batumi. The first river tankers are also his brainchild. He was the first to propose a method for extracting oil from the subsoil by pumping compressed air into a well.
Hidden from human eyes, oil extracted at a depth of 2.5 km using the Shukhov method comes to the commodity and raw material base of the Omsk Refinery from several fields in Western Siberia at once. Having traveled through pipelines, the length of which varies between 2-3 thousand km, it merges into a single stream in a pipe that approaches the plant itself. This is what is called Siberian Light commercial oil, which is classified as Light Sweet Oil (“light sweet oil”). Unlike many other varieties, this oil does not have a pungent sulfuric smell. That’s why it’s “light” - the sulfur content in it is much lower than, say, in export version Russian Urals oil. And believe it or not, its aroma is rather pleasant. I am not a petrochemist and cannot identify elements by smell. But for me this smell evoked associations with the honey of field herbs. To some extent, this is true, only these “fields” with all the living things on them bloomed tens, or even hundreds of millions of years ago.
Oil produced in different times, even at one field, does not have a permanent chemical composition. It varies depending on the depth. And this is precisely crude oil - not just unrefined, but also containing groundwater, associated gases and salts. Although Siberian Light is excellent for obtaining light petroleum products from it - gasoline, diesel, kerosene - in this form it cannot go directly into distillation. It has a long way to go in order to eventually fall apart, change its structure and become what we pour into the tank.
Second column
Oleg Gnedin, a young man of about thirty with a tan along the collar of his uniform jacket, still cannot get used to the white helmet that he has been wearing for two and a half years. At the factory, only bosses wear these. “Everyone already knows who I am,” he says of his subordinates, whom he prefers to call colleagues. But order is order.
60 000
tons of crude oil per day are processed by the Omsk Refinery
Oleg Gnedin's patrimony is the atmospheric-vacuum tube, or AVT, a complex for primary oil refining, consisting of several columns. If you type in the query “refineries” into Google search, then these are the ones you will see - shiny, plump, like baobabs, or graceful, like birch trees, forty-meter columns. There are five such units at the Omsk Refinery, but Gnedin’s AVT-10 will give everyone else a head start: it alone accounts for 8.5 million tons of refined oil per year. Or 23.5 thousand tons per day. 19 railway tanks per hour, or 458 per day. When the plant was launched in 1955, its entire capacity was only enough to process 750 thousand tons per year.
At AVT, oil, having settled in tanks, is supplied from the commodity base through a five-kilometer pipeline. As on pumping station 5 km from the installation, here the operator takes a sample of the arriving raw materials three times a day and sends it to the plant laboratory. This operator and laboratory assistant are the last ones to see the oil before it enters the installation columns. From that moment on, it ceases to be just oil.
The last time Oleg Gnedin saw “live” oil, not a sample, was five years ago. After scheduled repairs on my first AVT. Then the installation was launched New Year, frosts hit, and the oil simply froze in the pipeline before reaching the columns. “We steamed it for three days,” he recalls with a smile. “We brought steam into the well pipes. Day and night. Just before the New Year, oil began to flow - a fountain hit, and we all ended up under it. It probably felt like a driller’s.”
Oleg Gnedin gives me a tour of the AVT. We walk past humming pumps, pass between hot pipes, from which heat emanates, perceptible at a distance of several meters from them. The temperature of some of them is more than 300 degrees Celsius. It is to this level that oil is heated in a furnace before being processed. At the same time, the temperature in the lower part of the main atmospheric distillation column K-2 already reaches 350 degrees.
“What is important to understand is that there is not a single installation where we could obtain, for example, 95 gasoline,” explains Oleg Gnedin. “Here we receive only a few of its components. Next - isomerization, reforming, cracking, visbreaking, hydrotreating... Don’t understand what this is? Don't worry! When they brought me here for my first practice and took me around 20 installations, then I was in such a mess in my head that I couldn’t leave for several days. But it’s okay, I studied for another four years - and I understood everything.”
130 °C
lowest temperature in AVT columns
If you try to simplify, the primary process of oil refining looks like this. Through the pipe, after passing through the furnace, oil is supplied to the middle part of the rectification (that is, separation) column onto the feed plate and flows to its lower part. The plates, and there are about forty of them in the column, are designed to separate oil into its component parts - fractions. Vapors of already boiling oil rise from below towards the flow of liquid. They are the ones who heat the raw materials flowing down. Thus, on the trays of distillation columns, individual components are separated from the total mass: heat and mass exchange occurs. At the top, at the lowest temperature in the column (about 130 degrees), gasoline vapors and gases are collected, then, on the tenth plate, straight-run gasoline itself - this kind has not been used for refueling cars for more than 80 years. Below, between the twentieth and twenty-second plates, kerosene boils away at a temperature of 180 degrees. Another ten plates below and one hundred degrees above is diesel fuel. At the very bottom are the products with the most high temperature boiling - fuel oil, vacuum distillate and tar.
And if it was simple, then everything is much more complicated. In addition to K-2, the Gnedin installation also has K-1, K-8A, K-3, K-10. Each column has its own purpose. One - stabilizes straight-run gasoline, separates it from gases. From it it passes into another column, where it is divided into fractions - also under the influence of temperature and pressure. In the vacuum column, the oil strips will be removed to go to the oil production. Previously, it was part of the Omsk Refinery, but the scale of the business required the creation of a separate enterprise, and for several years now a separate enterprise has been producing oils and lubricants - the Omsk Lubricants Plant.
The characteristic “most”, so familiar to the Omsk Oil Refinery, can rightfully be used since last year in the story about the Omsk oil production. The most powerful complex in Russia for production, mixing, packaging and packing was launched here. motor oils, where the shoulder straps (that is, the components) of oils are cleaned, mixed, additives are added to them - and poured into cans (they are blown out here - in a special production facility), barrels or tanks. From Omsk a wide variety of oils - industrial, motor and transmission oils for commercial vehicles, passenger cars, ships and diesel locomotives - are sent to Russian regions, CIS countries and Central Asia, and to foreign countries.
History of development
It is believed that the world's first oil refinery was built in 1745 on the Ukhta River. His drawings, however, have not survived to this day. It is only known that oil was distilled there to improve its aromatic properties - for further use in medicine - and to produce kerosene, which was insignificant in volume.
More information about the Dubinin brothers plant, which was built in Mozdok in 1823. The Dubinins, three serfs from the Vladimir province, were the first to put oil refining on an industrial scale. Their enterprise was an oil distillation cube with a capacity of 500 liters. The lower part was smeared into a furnace buried in the ground. A pipe emerged from the copper lid of the cube, passed through a barrel of water and was immersed in a separate tank. The furnace was set on fire, the oil heated up and began to evaporate. These vapors, cooling in that part of the pipe that was passed through the barrel, condensed and accumulated in the form of a liquid in the second tank. As soon as the liquid began to darken, the stove was turned off. Thus, from 40 buckets of oil, the Dubinins received 16 buckets of photogen - a substance similar in its qualities to kerosene - a dead-end branch in the evolution of oil refining. The rest, and the rest was fuel oil, was thrown away.
As new properties of oil were discovered, the processes of its refining also improved. The Baku deposits became its center, as well as the center of production, in the Russian Empire from the mid-19th century. It was there that the world's first drilling rig was launched, and the first oil pipeline was built by Vladimir Shukhov. Thanks to Baku Russian Empire at the end of the century it came out on top in oil production in the world. However, for a long time, before the introduction of distillation columns into production in the 1880s, the main products were crude oil (the lion's share was exported) and kerosene. Before fuel oil was used - they started heating the boilers of ships - up to 80% of the distillation products burned in cesspools. The gasoline carburetor of Daimler and Maybach put an end to this. True, at first they used a straight-run product, the gasoline that today comes out of the second upper level of Oleg Gnedin’s AVT installation. It is characterized by low octane number and high sulfur content. Such fuel quickly wore out the engine and was ineffective.
Successor
The Omsk plant is a descendant of both the first plant in Ukhta and the distillation cube of the Dubinin brothers. But he has a direct connection precisely with Baku factories. And this connection can be traced not only in processes and structures, which, having been transformed and undergone improvements, remind us of how it all began.
It was in Baku in 1908 that Alexander Maluntsev, the first director of the Omsk Oil Refinery, was born. In the factory museum there is a massive director’s desk, where he once spent his days and nights. “They worked under Maluntsev,” they say here about the veterans of the enterprise. This means that they saw him, talked to him, received scolding from him or, conversely, praise. This means that they saw how he used to drive around the construction site at night or already neglected factory, checked if everything was working. He himself climbed into columns and reactors during repairs.
Inna Iosifovna Medvedovskaya, a lively lady in her eighties, is precisely from the first, Maluntsev generation of Omsk oil refiners. She gave 20 years of her life to the plant, working in the central research laboratory of the plant. “My husband and I arrived in 1956, when the plant was just being launched,” recalls Inna Iosifovna. “After graduating from Lvov Polytechnic, we had a choice - Odessa, Kherson or Omsk. And we decided to go to Omsk and explore Siberia. Our parents said that we were going into voluntary exile. But you understand what it’s all about - we were going to build a better life!”
Better life under Maluntsev was embodied not only in the construction and commissioning of the plant. Under him, an entire district was built - with its own stadium, hospitals, schools, kindergartens. A town of oil workers, in one of whose houses Medvedovskaya received us.
“The plant has a very special microclimate. And it seems to me that this is the merit of Maluntsev,” Medvedovskaya continues. “Oil then, by the way, was difficult. Imagine, you need 0.05% water in oil, no more, so that refining goes smoothly. And we received oil that contained 7% water! Of course, it wasn’t easy..."
Maluntsev died in Omsk in March 1962, five years before the first pipeline was connected to the plant. And in 1964, another native of Azerbaijan, Farman Salmanov, discovered Tyumen oil, and the Omsk plant has been operating on it ever since.
Another Baku resident Oleg Belyavsky, exactly 40 years after Maluntsev’s arrival in Omsk, first set foot outside the refinery entrance. The first working day then, in 1993, fell on May 9. Nobody even thought about taking a day off. Definitely not the commissioners, one of whom was Belyavsky, who built the new KT-1/1 at the Omsk Refinery in the very heart of the plant, a colossal complex for the deep processing of fuel oil, which has no analogues in Russia to this day. “I remember how I arrived at the CT on the first day,” Belyavsky now recalls. “Everything was noisy, welding was working, cranes were lifting the reactor. I looked at it and thought, there’s some serious work ahead.”
In conditions when the country collapsed, connections between enterprises collapsed and the most basic materials like fittings had to be traded on barter terms, KT-1/1 was launched on time in 1994. Later, Oleg Belyavsky, remaining at the plant after construction was completed, became its head. And 11 years after that, having gone through all management levels, he was appointed general director ONPZ. But Belyavsky still has special feelings for CT.
“Every repair, when the installations were stopped, I climbed inside myself. There is no column that I haven’t visited,” Belyavsky recalls, watching the workers. Although he is the director, he went to the site, dressed in all the rules - a uniform blue jacket and trousers, heavy boots with metal toes. And, of course, a white helmet. - At first, the first time it was scary. Because you climb into the reactor, there is darkness, there are 60 meters of emptiness under you. But then I got used to it. How else? This is my specialty. My life."
Basics
The cornerstone of all modern oil refining is the catalytic cracking process. It is on the basis of the gasoline component obtained with its help that what we then pour into the tank is created. Cracking, which means division, rupture, was invented by the same Vladimir Shukhov back in 1891. But it was thermal cracking. From the predecessors of modern AVT, fuel oil entered the reactors, and by even greater heating, light products - gasoline, kerosene, diesel - were again evaporated from it. When this process was mastered and implemented at refineries around the world, the refining depth was about 50%. The rest was still being burned.
91,7 %
indicator of the depth of oil refining at the Omsk Refinery (with an average value for Russian refineries of 75%)
Today at the Omsk Refinery the oil refining depth is 91.7% (the average is 75%). At the same time, only 0.4% is accounted for by irrecoverable losses. Everything else goes into action. Bitumen, coke, asphalt, fuel oil, tar, diesel engines, oils, gasoline, kerosene and more than 40 items that the plant produces. In 2015, the Omsk Refinery received 21 million tons of crude oil. Slightly less than 21 million tons of finished processed products left it in tanks and tankers for consumers. And the most complex product- namely gasoline.
Oleg Dmitrichenko is the head of production of deep oil refining and gasoline alkylation of the plant. That is, he is responsible for the processes through which petroleum products pass after leaving the AVT. While walking around KT-1/1 with Dmitrichenko, I increasingly use the word “transformation” in relation to oil. He doesn't like this word at all. I think I know why. It just doesn't involve work. It's as if everything comes on its own.
But why then almost 3 thousand employees, why 50 installations and this huge territory? Why 1.2 million analyzes that are carried out annually on oil and its products by the local laboratory? Why, after all, is there a driver in a diesel locomotive that pulls a kilometer-long train from Omsk to, say, Novosibirsk? It is recycling, because it is hard work. People and attitudes. The same catalytic cracking, which at one time made it possible to make a breakthrough in the depth of processing, is work. The work of furnaces, catalysts that clean raw materials so that up to 55% of the gasoline component is obtained from what was previously burned. Only one component out of ten, or even fifteen, of which Euro-5 will then be mixed. In some columns, like at AVT, oil is divided, in others straight-run gasoline is processed again, and then again. Some molecular bonds are broken and others are rearranged. And all in the end so that the engines work better and longer, and environment suffered less.
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| Text | Maxim Martemyanov |
| Photo | Dmitry Korotaev RIA Novosti ITAR-TASS Shukhov Tower Foundation JSC Gazpromneft-ONPZ PJSC Gazprom Neft |
| Video | Valery Kurakin |
| Design, programming and layout | Anton Zhukov Vladislav Sozonov |
| Build editor | Dmitry Kuchev |
| Project Manager | Ksenia Leonova |
- Deepest well
The world record for drilling the world's longest well belongs to the Russian Sakhalin-1 project. In April 2015, consortium members (Russian Rosneft, American ExxonMobil, Japanese Sodeco and Indian ONGC) drilled an inclined well 13,500 m deep along a horizontal offset 12,033 m long in the Chayvo field. The record for deep-water drilling belongs to the Indian ONGC: in January 2013, the company drilled an exploration well at a depth of 3,165 m off the east coast of India.The well drilled by Orlan is 2 kilometers deeper than the Mariana Trench. Photo: Rosneft
- The largest drilling platform
In this nomination, the Sakhalin-1 project again becomes the record holder: in June 2014, the Berkut platform was put into operation at the Arkutun-Dagi field. The height of a 50-story building (144 m) and weighing more than 200 thousand tons, it is capable of withstanding the onslaught of 20-meter waves, earthquakes up to 9 points on the Richter scale and temperatures up to -45 degrees Celsius with wind gusts of up to 120 km per hour. The construction of Berkut cost the consortium $12 billion.
Berkut, the world's largest drilling platform worth $12 billion. Photo: ExxonMobil - The highest drilling platform The most notable growth among drilling platforms is the deepwater oil field platform Petronius (operated by Chevron and Marathon Oil Corporation). Its height is 609.9 m, of which only 75 m is on the surface. Total weight structures - 43 thousand tons. The platform is operating 210 km off the coast of New Orleans at the Petronius field in the Gulf of Mexico.
- The deepest drilling platform
When Shell leased the Perdido block in the Gulf of Mexico, oil companies could develop fields at depths of no more than 1,000 m. Then it seemed that the development of technology had reached its limit. Today the Perdido platform stands at a depth of 2,450 m and is the deepest drilling and production platform in the world. Perdido is a true engineering marvel of its time. The fact is that at such extreme depths it is impossible to install the platform on supports. Plus, engineers had to take into account the difficult weather conditions of these latitudes: hurricanes, storms and strong currents. To solve the problem, a unique engineering solution was found: the upper structures of the platform were secured to a floating support, after which the entire structure was anchored with steel mooring cables on the ocean floor.
Perdido, not only one of the most beautiful, but also the deepest rig. Photo: Texas Charter Fleet
The largest oil tanker, and at the same time the largest sea vessel, built in the 20th century, was the Seawise Giant. The supertanker, almost 69 m wide, was 458.5 m long - 85 m more than the height of the Federation Tower, the tallest building in Europe today. Seawise Giant reached speeds of up to 13 knots (about 21 km per hour) and had a cargo capacity of almost 650,000 m3 of oil (4.1 million barrels). The super-tanker was launched in 1981 and over its almost 30-year history has changed several owners and names, and even crashed when it came under fire from the Iraqi Air Force during the First Gulf War. In 2010, the ship was forced ashore near the Indian city of Alang, where its hull was disposed of within a year. But one of the giant’s 36-ton main anchors was preserved for history: it is now on display at the Maritime Museum in Hong Kong.
The longest oil pipeline in the world is “Eastern Siberia – Pacific Ocean” with a capacity of about 80 million tons of oil per year. Its length from Taishet to Kozmino Bay in Nakhodka Bay is 4857 km, and taking into account the branch from Skovorodino to Daqing (PRC) - another 1023 km (i.e. 5880 km in total). The project was launched at the end of 2012. Its cost was 624 billion rubles. Among gas pipelines, the record for length belongs to the Chinese West-East project. The total length of the gas pipeline is 8704 km (including one main line and 8 regional branches). The pipeline capacity is 30 billion cubic meters of gas per year, the project cost was about $22 billion.
The ESPO oil pipeline extending beyond the horizon. Photo: Transneft
The record holder among deep-sea pipelines is the Russian Nord Stream, running from the Russian Vyborg to the German Lubmin along the bottom of the Baltic Sea. This is both the deepest (the maximum depth of the pipe is 210 m) and the longest route (1,124 km) among all undersea pipelines in the world. Bandwidth pipeline - 55 billion cubic meters. m of gas per year (2 lines). The cost of the project, launched in 2012, amounted to 7.4 billion euros.
Laying the offshore section of the Nord Stream gas pipeline. Photo: Gazprom- The largest deposit
“King of the Giants” is the second name of the largest and, perhaps, most mysterious oil field in the world - Gavar, located in Saudi Arabia. Its dimensions shock even the most experienced geologists - 280 km by 30 km and elevate Gavar to the rank of the largest developed oil field in the world. The field is fully owned by the state and managed by the state-owned company Saudi Aramco. And therefore very little is known about it: the actual current production figures are not disclosed by either the company or the government. All information about Gavar is mainly historical, collected from random technical publications and rumors. For example, in April 2010, Aramco Vice President Saad al-Treiki told the Saudi media that the field’s resources are truly limitless: over 65 years of development, it has already produced more than 65 billion barrels of oil, and the company estimates the field’s residual resources at more than 100 billion barrels. According to experts from the International Energy Agency, this figure is more modest – 74 billion barrels. Among the gas giants, the title of leader belongs to the two-part North/South Pars field, located in the central part of the Persian Gulf in the territorial waters of Iran (South Pars) and Qatar (North). The total reserves of the field are estimated at 28 trillion. cube m of gas and 7 billion tons of oil.
The largest and one of the most mysterious deposits in the world. Graphics: Geo Science World - The largest refinery
The world's largest oil refinery is located in India in the city of Jamnagar. Its capacity is almost 70 million tons per year (for comparison: the most large plant in Russia - the Kirishi Oil Refinery of Surgutneftegaz - three times less - only 22 million tons per year). The plant in Jamnagar covers an area of more than 3 thousand hectares and is surrounded by an impressive mango forest. By the way, this plantation of 100 thousand trees brings the plant additional income: About 7 thousand tons of mangoes are sold from here every year. The Jamnagar refinery is private and owned by Reliance Industries Limited, whose director and owner, Mukesh Ambani, is the richest man in India. Forbes magazine estimates his fortune at $21 billion and ranks him 39th on the list of the richest people in the world.
The capacity of Jamangara is three times greater than that of the largest Russian oil refinery. Photo: projehesap.com
77 million tons per year - this is how much LNG is produced at the industrial sites of Ras Laffan - a unique energy hub located in Qatar and the world's largest center for the production of liquefied natural gas. Ras Laffan was conceived as an industrial site for processing gas from the unique Severnoye field, located 80 km from the coast of Ras Laffan. The first power facilities of the energy center were launched in 1996. Today, Ras Laffan is located on an area of 295 square meters. km (of which 56 sq. km is occupied by the port) and has 14 LNG production lines. Four of them (with a capacity of 7.8 million tons each) are the largest in the world. Among the “attractions” of the energy city are oil and gas processing plants, power plants (including solar), oil and gas chemistry, as well as the world’s largest plant for the production of synthetic liquid fuel– Pearl GTL (capacity 140,000 barrels per day).
The Pearl GTL plant (pictured) is just part of the Ras Laffan energy hub. Photo: Qatargas
The Petronius drilling rig is almost twice as tall as the Federation tower - 609 versus 343 meters. Photo: primofish.com
An oil refinery is an industrial enterprise whose main function is the processing of oil into gasoline, aviation kerosene, fuel oil, diesel fuel, lubricating oils, lubricants, bitumen, petroleum coke, raw materials for petrochemicals. The production cycle of a refinery usually consists of the preparation of raw materials, primary distillation of oil and secondary processing of petroleum fractions: catalytic cracking, catalytic reforming, coking, viscosity breaking, hydrocracking, hydrotreating and mixing of finished petroleum product components. There are many oil refineries in Russia. Some refineries have been operating for quite a long time - since the war years, others were put into operation relatively recently. The youngest plant of the enterprises considered was Achinsk Refinery, it has been operating since 2002.
The site compiled a rating of refineries supplying Russian regions with petroleum products.
1. -oil refining enterprise located in the Bolsheuluisky district Krasnoyarsk Territory. The company was founded on September 5, 2002. Owned by Rosneft.
2. Komsomolsk Oil Refinery is a Russian oil refinery located in the Khabarovsk Territory in the city of Komsomolsk-on-Amur. Also owned by OJSC NK Rosneft. Built in 1942. It occupies a significant place in oil refining in the Russian Far East.
3. - Russian oil refinery in the Samara region. Part of the OJSC NK Rosneft group. Year of foundation - 1945.
4. - oil refining enterprise, located in Moscow, in the Kapotnya district. The plant was put into operation in 1938.
5. - Russian oil refinery in the Samara region. Part of the OJSC NK Rosneft group. The refinery was founded in 1951.
6. Omsk Oil Refinery is one of the largest oil refineries in Russia. Owned by Gazprom Neft. On September 5, 1955 it was put into operation.
7. - Russian oil refinery. Also known as "Cracking". Part of the TNK-BP group. Located in the city of Saratov. Founded in 1934.
8. - Russian oil refinery in the Samara region. Part of the OJSC NK Rosneft group. Operating since 1942.
9. - Russian oil refinery in Krasnodar region. The plant forms a single production complex with the marine terminal of the Rosneft oil products supply enterprise - OJSC NK Rosneft-Tuapsenefteproduct. The bulk of the products are exported. It is part of the Rosneft oil company. Founded in 1929.
10. - Russian refinery, the leading Far Eastern producer of motor and boiler fuel. Part of NK Alliance. The enterprise's capacity is 4.35 million tons of oil per year. Founded in 1935.
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