A refinery into components which can be used as fuels, lubricants, and as feedstocks in petrochemical processes that manufacture such products as plastics, detergents, solvents, elastomers and fibers such as nylon and polyesters.
From Crude Oil. The oil refining process starts with a fractional distillation column. The problem with crude oil is that it contains hundreds of different types of hydrocarbons all mixed together. You have to separate the different types of hydrocarbons to have anything useful. Fortunately there is an easy way to separate things, and this is what oil refining is all about. To understand the diversity contained in crude oil, and to understand why refining crude oil is so important in our society, look through the following list of products that come from crude oil: Petroleum gas-used for heating, cooking, making plastics. 1  small alkanes (1 to 4 carbon atoms). Instead, the hundreds of different hydrocarbon molecules in crude oil are separated in a refinery into components which can be used as fuels, lubricants, and as feedstocks in petrochemical processes that manufacture such products as plastics, detergents, solvents, elastomers and fibers such as nylon and polyesters. An oil refinery or petroleum refinery is an industrial process plant where crude oil is processed and refined into more useful products such as petroleum naphtha, gasoline, diesel fuel, asphalt base, heating oil, kerosene and liquefied petroleum gas. Refining. Petroleum refining refers to the process of converting crude oil into useful products. Crude oil is composed of hundreds of different hydrocarbon molecules, which are separated through the process of refining. The process is divided into three basic steps: separation, conversion, and treatment Fractional distillation of crude oil. Because they have different boiling points, the substances in crude oil can be separated using fractional distillation. The crude oil is evaporated and its vapours allowed to condense at different temperatures in the fractionating column. Fractional distillation. Fractional distillation differs from distillation only in that it separates a mixture into a number of different parts, called fractions. A tall column is fitted above the mixture, with several condensers coming off at different heights. The column is hot at the bottom and cool at the top Separation. Separation refers to the process of distillation. Crude oil is heated in a furnace so that hydrocarbons can be separated via their boiling point. Inside large towers, heated petroleum vapors are separated into fractions according to weight and boiling point. Petroleum refining refers to the process of converting crude oil into useful products. Crude oil is composed of hundreds of different hydrocarbon molecules, which are separated through the process of refining. The process is divided into three basic steps: separation, conversion, and treatme Crude oil is separated in a separation column. Separation columns are used to heat the crude then the different hydrocarbons separate as the lighter ones float up and the dens … er ones fall to the bottom. LPG gas floats to the top, bitumen and paraffin wax sink to the bottom with diesel, kerosene, petrol and others in the middle.
http://science.howstuffworks.com/environmental/energy/oil-refining2.htm https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_refinery http://www.petroleum.co.uk/refining http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/gcsebitesize/science/aqa_pre_2011/rocks/fuelsrev3.shtml http://www.petroleum.co.uk/refining http://www.answers.com/Q/How_is_crude_oil_separated_into_several_types_of_chemicals
why is crude oil separated into