Williams Cos. Inc. has started its second extraction plant fed by off-gases from a Canadian bitumen upgrader.
According to press reports, the upgrader is the Horizon facility operated by Canadian Natural Resources Ltd. (OGJ Online, Sept. 27, 2012). The first Williams off-gas extraction plant is at the Suncor Energy Inc. upgrader. Both upgraders are near Fort McMurray.
In an earlier report, Williams said the new plant will be able to recover 12,000 b/d of NGL initially and 15,000 b/d eventually.
It will lower emissions of carbon dioxide by 200,000 tonnes/year and of sulfur dioxide by 2,800 tonnes/year.
The NGL-olefins mixture extracted at the upgraders moves through Williams’s recently extended Boreal Pipeline to the Redwater Olefinic Fractionator near Edmonton.
