asphaltenes

For many projects, asphaltene management plans are a matter of remediation or prevention. In the past decade, models have been developed to predict how asphaltene particles will behave in oil—the conditions under which precipitation and agglomeration occur.

Rice University has been working on effective models of phase behavior and asphaltene deposition as a path to improved design that can reduce this challenge for operators.

As the world's supply of crude becomes heavier, many of the world’s oil producers will have to think more carefully about heavy crudes and the challenges they pose for processing, storage, and transportation.