English 
Spanish 
4 min read
0 comments
Explore Ras Tanura: the Saudi oil island megaproject capable of producing 500 barrels/day of oil and gas.
Despite the global trend towards sustainability, Oil remains a vital resource for the world's energy supply. According to data from the International Energy Agency in 2020, oil and its derivatives represented 29,5% of the global energy source that year. Saudi Arabia, a player key in this sector for decades, is now launching an ambitious megaproject: an oil and gas island, reaffirming its influence in the energy market.
Saudi Arabia's oil island megaproject covers 15 km²
One of the Saudi references in the oil and gas sector is also one of the oldest refineries in the Persian Gulf. This is the Ras Tanura, which is the largest producer of barrels of oil in Saudi Arabia and one of the 12 largest in the world ranking.
Located on the west coast of Saudi Arabia, the city of Ras Tanura is considered a historic region of the Asian country and amidst so much tradition and a large oil and gas reserve, the city has been home, since the 1940s, to the oil heart of Saudi Arabia. Saudi.
- Petrobras surprises and inaugurates its new platform ahead of schedule! The unit has a capacity of up to 100 THOUSAND barrels per day and can generate enough energy to supply a city of 230 million inhabitants
- Petrobras revolutionizes the market and launches a notice for 8 RSVs: find out the details of the bidding that will move billions!
- BP backs off oil and gas cuts, focuses on new investments in the Middle East and Gulf of Mexico
- OPEC revises Brazil's oil production and GDP, warns of inflation and rising costs in offshore production
The i megaprojectSaudi Arabian oil island It is part of a complex that covers a region of 15 square km. To give you an idea, this is only approximately 1 km smaller than one of the most extensive and traditional districts of São Paulo: Santo Amaro.
O mega project The oil and gas complex houses a series of facilities and among them are a petrochemical plant, a port, a terminal for crude oil and refined products, a maritime terminal and a power plant. Currently, the Saudi Arabian oil island megaproject still has 3.200 residents, including some of American and British origin.
Construction of the oil and gas megaproject employed thousands of people around the world
Construction of the Saudi Arabian oil island megaproject involved enormous efforts by Arranco, a company formed by the Arab government and a joint venture of four North American companies. In fact, gradually, the Saudi government bought shares in these companies until it became the sole owner of the company in the 1980s.
In fact, the construction of Ras Tanura involved a mobilization of thousands of workers and the importance of large quantities of materials and equipment from around the world. The project was carried out in several phases, the first of which was aimed at building a small refinery with a capacity of 50 thousand barrels per day, that is, just 9,1% of the current capacity.
In the following years, the megaproject underwent expansions and modernizations with the construction of new processing units and the incorporation of new technologies to increase efficiency and production. One of the major expansions only took place during the 1970s when the capacity of Saudi Arabia's oil island was increased to current numbers of 550 thousand barrels of oil per day.
Understand how Saudi Arabia's oil island works
In addition to a sulfur recovery unit and several storage tanks and pipelines, the space has at least seven essential sessions for different types of oil processing.
They are: the crude oil distillation unit, the first stage of the refining process, in which crude oil is heated and separated into several fractions according to boiling points, vacuum installation unit, where the heaviest fractions of crude oil are separated, using a process called vacuum distillation, a unit called hydrocracker, where heavy hydrocarbons are transformed into light hydrocarbons.
In this process, hydrogen gas and a catalyst are used, and in the fluid catavitic cracker session, the previous process is refined by occupying the heavy hydrocarbons in lighter ones also through a catalyst. There are still three other units dedicated to the oil refining process.
Na alkylation unit, light hydrocarbons are combined to create high-octane gasoline.
Na isomerization unit, hydrocarbons straight-chain hydrocarbons are converted into branched-chain hydrocarbons, which are more valuable as gasoline. Finally the renovation unit is responsible for converting low-octane naphtha into high-octane gasoline.
