Gulf Coast refinery eliminates zinc silicate deposition in critical heat exchangers

What this case study covers

A >250,000 BPD Gulf Coast refinery was losing production capacity to deposition in critical heat exchangers — despite a well-controlled zinc-phosphate program. The root cause was a salt the standard prediction tools were not built to see.

Inside this case study

• Root cause analysis: why standard tools missed zinc silicate
• Competing-ion saturation modeling methodology
• Control limit adjustments for zinc, CoC, polymer and pH
• Quantified production and water savings