Coker units are a critical part of the distillation process and are used to break down crude oil. Flow meters are used to help ensure the highest optimization and productivity of the distillation process.
"With the strong push on building and upgrading delayed coking units in refineries, particularly those in the U.S., Canada, India, and Eastern Europe, refiners are choosing ultrasonic flowmeters for coker furnace feed flow in new construction to avoid problematic furnace tube clogging and to help optimize their operations," said Ashish Bhandari, Product General Manager for Flow at GE Sensing & Inspection Technologies.
The coker unit at BP Whiting is being developed on the Foster Wheeler process design. BP and Foster Wheeler requested maintenance free flow meters that offer high repeatability, allowing for advanced unit optimization. GE's flow meter solutions offer extremely high availability, virtually no pressure drop and better than 0.5% repeatability at temperatures up to 1,100°F.
Ultrasonic flow meters, like GE's Bundled Waveguide Technology, operate in very hot, high pressure, and hostile environments inside the pipe. Unlike other technologies that have difficulty operating in these volatile conditions, ultrasonic flow meters provide operations with the confidence and reliability needed to reduce unit cycle times, which enables significant increases in production rates.
About GE Sensing & Inspection Technologies
GE Sensing & Inspection Technologies is Healthcare for Infrastructure. The business is part of GE Enterprise Solutions, a $5 billion business helping customers compete and win in a changing global environment by combining the power of GE's unique expertise and intelligent technology to elevate customers' productivity. GE Sensing & Inspection Technologies is a leading innovator in advanced measurement, sensor-based and inspection solutions that deliver accuracy, productivity and safety to its customers. Its products are used in a wide range of industries, including oil & gas, power generation, aerospace, transportation and healthcare. The company has 4,700 employees at more than 40 facilities in 25 countries worldwide.