Petroleum Power Plant in Texas

¶ … Petroleum Hydrocarbon Power Plant in Texas The petroleum industry is one of the most profitable industries across the globe since it involves domestic exploration, creation, and transportation of oil and gas. This process is usually carried out through a network of distribution facilities and systems that focus on exploration, production, and transportation of petroleum products. Given the potential success and profitability of this business, developing a petroleum hydrocarbon-based power plant is an attractive business opportunity.

However, for economic reasons, there are relatively few places where petroleum products can be purchased, transported, and utilized. A utility company is attempting to develop a petroleum hydrocarbon-based power plant in Texas given the attractiveness of the petroleum industry. The company's choice of Texas as a suitable location for its operations is influenced by the fact that Texas was the leading crude-oil state in the United States in 2014 ("Profile Overview," n.d.).

During this period, Texas surpassed the production levels of crude oil and petroleum related products to an extent that it even exceeded those from the federal offshore areas. By the beginning of 2015, the 27 petroleum power plants in this state had more than 5.1 million barrels of crude oil on a daily basis and accounted for nearly 30% of America's refining capacity. In light of these statistics, Texas is a suitable location for this utility company to build its power plant.

The exploration, production, and transportation of petroleum and its related products are characterized by several air pollution concerns emerging from various sources in the activities and operations of such power plants. The primary sources of air pollution in petroleum power plants include burning of fuels for energy production and transportation reasons (combustion emissions), equipment leaks (fugitive emissions), emissions from process units and vents (process emissions), and emissions from storage (storage and handling emissions).

Some of the primary air pollution concerns from these activities include toxics like benzene, greenhouse gas emissions like carbon dioxide, acid emissions, and smog precursors. The emissions from petroleum power plants have considerable environmental impacts such as climate change that has developed to become a major issue across the globe. Therefore, it is increasingly important to identify and/or develop suitable measures for handling air pollution sources and concerns from these plants.

One of the best possible measures is through handling petroleum products in an environmentally friendly manner before burning in order to lessen these impacts. Generally, air pollution from production of oil and gas such as burning petroleum products is characterized by explosive hydrocarbons in fugitive emissions (St. Cholakov, 2003, p.6). Petroleum products can be treated before burning in order to minimize some of the environmental problems associated with production of oil and gas.

Treatment involves the use of various methods to remove and/or separate non-hydrocarbons, impurities, and other constituents ("Petroleum Refining Process," n.d.). In most cases, treatment entails physical separation and/or chemical reactions such as chemical sweetening, solvent extraction, clay contacting caustic washing, solvent dewaxing, and acid treating. These processes slightly increase the cost of power generation because of additional processes and/or chemicals for treating petroleum products. As previously mentioned, burning of petroleum products in power plants generates numerous environmental problems including greenhouse gas emissions and release.