Volatile Organic Compound Emission Status and Control Perspectives in the Petroleum Refining Industry in China

Abstract

Given the increasingly serious ozone pollution, petroleum refining has received more attention, since it is one of the dominant volatile organic compound-emitting industries in China. Volatile organic compound emission source identification, control efficiency classification, emissions calculation, emission factor generation and uncertainty analysis were performed in this study. According to the VOC emission control level, petroleum refining enterprises were divided into three levels, accounting for 10.6%, 54.4% and 35% of the total refining capacity, and 0.6%, 1.2%, and 3% were generated as the emission factor for each designed level, respectively. The total volatile organic compound emissions of the China petroleum refining industry in 2020 are estimated to be 1150 Kt by applying the hierarchical accounting method. Furthermore, the spatial distribution of volatile organic compound emissions was analyzed. The emission intensity of 15 cities is greater than the national average value of 0.12 tons/km2, where the highest level is approximately 2.7 tons/km2. To reduce the volatile organic compound emissions of PR enterprises, the collection efficiency and operation effect of treatment facilities are the most important points based on the analysis of the current situation of volatile organic compound emissions in the PR industry in China.