Gases play an important role in the oil refining process, in all three stages of : separation, conversion and treating. High-quality gases improve the refining process, and ensure the safety of the end products. Gulf Cryo is a bulk producer of industrial liquid nitrogen, which is delivered to several oil and gas refineries, used for pipelines, purging, pigging, and tank blanketing.

Nitrogen is Gulf Cryo’s leading product for the oil & gas sector; it is widely used in refineries due to its inerting properties. In refineries, N2 is used for blanketing of tanks, preventing the release of hydrocarbon emission and for preventing the ingress of oxygen into vacuum units. N2 is also used to calm chemical reactions and safely shutdown, or start-up the various units that constitute the refinery.

Environmental regulations have helped Gulf Cryo supply increasing amount of hydrogen to refineries. H2 is mainly used to achieve lower sulphur content in hydrocrackers and hydro-treaters. To further improve on sulphur recovery efficiency, oxygen is injected in a Claus type sulphur unit, thus providing a capacity advantage as well as combustion efficiency at the furnace. In addition to sulphur recovery recovery applications, O2 is widely used for breaking of heavy hydrocarbons during the catalytic cracking process.

Oil service companies also rely on Gulf Cryo to supply nitrogen manly used for oil well pressurization and purging applications.

The Gulf Cryo Advantage

Sadara (a joint venture between Dow Chemicals & ARMCO, a $20 billion project) has set up an integrated complex of 25 chemical production plants in Jubail Industrial City, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Gulf Cryo was awarded a project to supply storage and delivery equipment, manpower, and liquid nitrogen to various plants in Sadara in 2014.

KNPC is a key nitrogen customer for our nitrogen business in Kuwait. The 3 refineries in Kuwait have various application points in their premises and require high pressure nitrogen to be supplied when needed. Through our fleet of 26 high-pressure tube trailers, nitrogen is delivered to these applications points. Some of the tube trailers are also hydrogen rated and are therefore used to deliver hydrogen to various petrochemical plants and refineries across the region during commissioning and start-ups.