The South Atlantic Refinery Company (SARC) are proposing

Project Profile 

For more Information 

contact: 

Michael Grimley 

Business Manager 

GSA Ltd 

+44 (0)1724 275200 

mgrimley@GSA-Ltd.co.uk 

Or visit our website: 

www.gsa-ltd.co.uk 

The South Atlantic Refinery Company (SARC) are 

proposing to develop a new “Greenfield” 200,000 

barrels per day refinery in Brazil 

The refinery will efficiently process heavy crudes into high margin, high demand 

Euro V specification diesel. This will be achieved by developing an Integrated Site 

Solution whereby the refinery will be self-sufficient in fuel, power and hydrogen by 

using modern technology which is both more efficient and cleaner than the more 

traditional refinery configurations. 

GSA have been engaged by SARC to act as the “Clients Engineer” for the Project 

and to develop the engineering up to and including the “Basic Engineering 

Packages” (BEP) for all the refinery utilities and offsites. The main refinery process 

units are being engineered by the respective licensors, namely Shell Global 

Solutions and Kellogg Brown and Root. 

The novel configuration will allow significant capital investment savings to be made 

compared to the more traditional refinery configuration. The capital cost for this 

refinery is estimated to be the order of $3billion. 

As the client engineer GSA’s role is to technically liaise with all interested parties 

including all the relevant Brazilian Authorities including National and State 

Governments, providing continuity between the licensors and to advise SARC on 

technical issues. Within this role we are also providing significant input in the 

Environmental Impact Assessments for both the refinery and the offshore 

monobuoys. 

GSA’s role in engineering the BEP’s includes offloading/loading facilities, the tank 

farms, steam and power generation, flares and blowdowns, effluent treatment and 

disposal and all the usual refinery common services. 

As the clients engineer, GSA is providing bespoke solutions to ensure that 

the different technologies operate correctly and efficiently.



contact: 



GSA Ltd 

+44 (0)1724 275200 




Yemen Oil Field Developments 

Crude Processing Facility (CPF) Improvements 

The scope of this project was to 

condition the produced water 

from an existing field (operated 

by the end client DNO) for 

reinjection underground into the 

reservoir. The existing CPF had 

not been built to handle the large 

quantities of water which are 

currently being extracted. To 

handle this water GSA have 

designed a system using a 

combination of Skim Tanks, 

Surge Tank, Polishing Filters 

(future), and Injection Pumps with 

the required utility services. 

In addition GSA have engineered the expansion of the CPF including a manifold, 

two three phase separators along with a suitable flare system that can cope with 

the maximum gas flow from the wells. 

New Field Development 

A new site is being developed by our 

client DNO for which GSA are 

engineering the crude production 

facility. This is to replace an existing 

temporary exploration treatment plant 

and will utilize some of the services. 

The project requires the transport of 

the product crude to another 

production facility for final separation 

of the crude before export. In addition 

the gas extracted is to be used for fuel 

gas on the CPF site and at another 

site 23km away. The gas will require conditioning prior to this, including 

dehydration before entry into the transport pipeline. The remaining gas will require 

suitable flare systems. 

Prior to the installation of the temporary facility, GSA also carried out initial 

engineering of the CPF including extensive simulation modelling using different 

throughput rates and pressures from the field. The client is currently implementing 

this work. 

Test Facilities or Full Capacity Crude Processing Facilities; GSA has the 

capability and experience to develop suitable sites cost effectively and 

quickly.



contact: 



GSA Ltd 

+44 (0)1724 275200 




Kharg and Lavan Islands Processing Plants 

Refurbishment and Debottlenecking Project 

This project is being carried out for the Iranian Offshore Oil Company (IOOC) a 

subsidiary company of the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC). 

With Our Iranian joint venture partner Hirgan Energy Engineering. The project will 

result in almost 70,000 man-hours of design work for the partnership for the 

upgrade of three oil facilities in the Persian Gulf. 

The work scope for each facility involves the design and techno-economic 

evaluation of a number of possible conceptual design options for the upgrades for 

each facility and to then aid the client in selecting a preferred option for which GSA 

will complete the Front End Engineering Design and prepare procurement 

documentation to allow the client to move into a construction phase. 

The main part of the development is the 

debottlenecking and renovation of up to 4 onshore 

crude oil primary processing facilities 

at Kharg Island. Each facility processes 

crude from a particular field in the 

gulf. There are options to either upgrade the 

units in the existing facilities or replace them 

by building an entirely new unit capable of 

meeting a processing capacity of around 

300,000 barrels a day. 

The second development, also associated 

with Kharg Island, is to resolve corrosion 

problems in the subsea transfer line to the 

on-shore plant by removing water from the oil 

at the well production platforms before it is 

pumped to shore. This project goal is to 

reduce the water percentage to about 0.2 per 

cent by volume. 

Work at the third facility, on Lavan Island, is safety related involving the installation 

of Fire and Gas Detection systems, an upgrade and extension of the fire fighting 

systems and the provision of a new control room with modern DCS control 

facilities. 

Test Facilities or Full Capacity Crude Processing Facilities; GSA has the 

capability and experience to develop suitable sites cost effectively and 

quickly



contact: 



GSA Ltd 

+44 (0)1724 275200 




Vanadium and Nickel Recovery from Refinery and 

Power Station Residues 

Increasing demand for oil has lead to wider use of heavy crudes such as those 

from Venezuela and Canada, these crudes contain quantities of vanadium and 

nickel which concentrate in residues such as gasifier soots, flexicoke and power 

station ashes. In addition, desulphurisation and demetallisation catalysts used by 

refiners contain quantities vanadium, nickel and often molybdenum. 

GSA have a record in recovery of these metals 

going back almost ten years as designers, 

installers and latterly operators of a Metals 

Recovery Plant in Harwich. The plant continues to 

operate as a viable stand alone business and 

as a vehicle to support project work on oil 

industry residues. 

Venezuela 

GSA is currently working on a scheme to recover vanadium pentoxide from 

flexicoke residues arising at Amuay Refinery in Venezuela. The project is being 

carried out on behalf of PDVSA, the refinery owner, through their technology arm, 

Intevep. The project has progressed through laboratory trials to full-scale plant 

trials so far 2000 tonnes of flexicoke have been sent to the plant and are being 

processed. Processing is proceeding well with very high quality vanadium 

chemicals being produced for sale for use as catalysts. A full scale scheme for a 

plant to treat 25,000 tonnes of flexicoke has now bee proposed to Intevep and we 

expect to begin the design work in Q4 2007. 

Europe 

GSA has conducted laboratory trials for Shell Global Technologies to provide a 

design basis for the treatment of residues from Shell licence gasifiers. The work 

has shown that ammonium metavanadate can be produced from the residues. This 

AMV can be further processed to produce vanadium pentoxide and fused flake. 

GSA has applied for a patent on the process and is working with Shell to develop 

this technology 

Brazil 

The South Atlantic Refining Company plant in 

Sergipe will use GSA technology to treat 

gasifier residues. 

United Kingdom 

GSA are currently considering building a 

process plant in the UK to exploit the recovery 

and extraction technology. 

GSA has the experience and ability to test, develop and realise metals recovery 

potential with the additional benefit of understanding the metals bulletin 

markets



contact: 



GSA Ltd 

+44 (0)1724 275200 




Plant Conversion Project—Lubricant to Biodiesel 

GSA were initially approached by a multinational PMS company who had been engaged to 

prepare an appraisal of an existing, partially decommissioned, chemical factory prior to 

acquisition. GSA were tasked to carry out a technical evaluation of the existing site and 

equipment including an assessment of potential future environmental liabilities. On balance 

the overall appraisal was positive and resulted in the acquisition of the site. GSA were then 

retained to carry out the design and project management activities necessary to bring the 

factory back into operation and convert it to the 

manufacture of biodiesel fuel. 

The main tasks were:- 

1) Initial Site Appraisal Stage 

• Review existing historical contaminated land 

surveys 

• Conduct gap analysis between information 

available and historical use and carry out risk 

assessments 

• Review maintenance and inspection histories for main site equipment to form an 

assessment of condition and remaining life 

• Survey infrastructure and assess condition including steam, compressed air, cooling 

water, power (HV and LV), control systems, etc. 

• Preliminary ‘order of magnitude’ assessment of costs for reversal of 

decommissioning and conversion to biodiesel production 

2) Detailed Design 

Following acquisition of the site GSA took on responsibility for project management 

including all detailed design. The design was carried out on a reimbursable basis and 

involved:- 

• Process development from client R&D to identify how best to reconfigure the site for 

production of biodiesel 

• Process design & new equipment specification and selection 

• Reconfiguration of old pipework systems and specification of new 

• Overhaul of main equipment for reuse 

• Electrical and Instrumentation systems overhaul/reconfiguration/renewal 

• Liaison with Environmental, Planning and HSE bodies 

3) Site Management 

GSA engineers oversaw all site installation work and the plant was tested and 

commissioned successfully by GSA in 7 months from initially being acquired by the Client. 

GSA has in depth understanding of ass aspects of biodiesel manufacture 

including novel process development and off-the-shelf technology

The South Atlantic Refinery Company (SARC) are proposing

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