Chemical & Petrochemical

Process heaters supply the energy that drives cracking, reforming, distillation reboiling, and thermal processing. CPE provides engineering across the full range of fired heater configurations: vertical cylindrical (cabin), horizontal tube box, helical coil, and direct-fired reboilers. Our scope includes heater performance assessment and rating - evaluating radiant and convection section duty split, bridgewall temperature, tube metal temperatures, and excess air levels against design conditions. We handle burner evaluation and specification (low-NOx burner selection, BMS review, combustion tuning for natural gas, refinery fuel gas, and liquid fuels), convection section and extended surface optimization, draft system analysis across natural, forced, induced, and balanced draft configurations, fuel train design and NFPA 86/API 556 compliance, and tube life assessment and materials selection for high-temperature service.

Process heaters in petrochemical service often operate at high tube metal temperatures with process fluids prone to coking, fouling, or degradation if heat flux distribution is uneven. CPE's approach accounts for these realities - evaluating flame impingement risk, tube-to-tube heat flux variation, and the relationship between firing rate, excess air, and process-side fouling rates.

Chemical and petrochemical processes reject heat at virtually every step - from reactor exotherms, distillation overhead condensers, compressor intercoolers, and high-temperature flue gas exhaust from fired equipment. CPE identifies and designs waste heat recovery systems that capture this energy and return it to the process as preheated combustion air, boiler feedwater heating, process stream preheating, or steam generation. Specific scope includes waste heat boilers and HRSGs, economizers on fired heater and boiler stacks, air preheater systems (recuperative and regenerative), heat pipe and heat wheel systems, hot oil and thermal fluid systems, and direct-contact heat recovery for appropriate applications.

The engineering challenge in waste heat recovery is rarely whether it is thermodynamically possible - it almost always is. The challenge is whether the recovered energy is at a useful temperature, whether the heat exchanger can withstand the process environment (corrosion, fouling, thermal cycling), and whether the capital cost is justified by the fuel savings. CPE's feasibility work addresses all three before recommending a capital commitment.

Beyond thermal oxidizers and flare systems, chemical and petrochemical plants require back-end emissions controls for combustion equipment and process sources. CPE designs and specifies SCR and SNCR for NOx control on fired equipment, CO catalytic oxidation systems, wet and dry scrubber systems for acid gas removal (SO₂, HCl, HF), ESPs and fabric filter baghouses for particulate control, CEMS integration, and stack testing coordination and regulatory reporting support.

CPE is experienced with the regulatory frameworks that govern chemical and petrochemical air emissions - including MACT standards for chemical manufacturing (HON, MON, Subpart FFFF), petroleum refinery NSPS and NESHAP, Title V permitting, and state-specific programs across multiple Gulf Coast jurisdictions.

CPE executes chemical and petrochemical work under ASME Boiler and Pressure Vessel Code (Sections I, II, IV, VIII), ASME B31.1 and B31.3, API 530 (fired heater tube calculations), API 556 (fired heater instrumentation), API 560 (fired heater design), NFPA 85 and NFPA 86, ISA 84/IEC 61511, TEMA standards for heat exchangers, and EPA NSPS, NESHAP, MACT, and state air quality programs.