Introduction:

In the gas fractionation unit of Cienfuegos refinery, the production of Liquefied Petroleum Gas and Stable Light Virgin Naphtha are produced with the highest possible quality. However, this process residual does not have the appropriate treatment yet, so waste disposal regulations are not met.

Objetive:

To evaluate the sustainability of gas fractionation unit process at Refinería Cienfuegos S.A through an emergent analysis.

Materials y Methods:

During the research development, the emergy methodology developed by (Odum, 1996) was applied making it some adjustments

Results y Discussion:

It was determined that 57.75 % of fractionation process depends on economy materials and 42.25% is based on natural resources. The transformability of LPG (such as 1.4984 E+13 seJ/J) and that of NVLE (such as 9.0531 E+12 seJ/J) was quantified, demonstrating with these results a sulfur products correct removal; this fractionation system particularization has special relevance for emergy studies replication in similar processes in the country. The index of emergent sustainability (ESI) calculated was 1.21 which indicates that the process is not sustainable in the long term, but it contribute to local development.

Conclusions:

Therefore, the system must be restructured to improve its efficiency and allow efficient resources use, in addition to proposing possible alternatives that can contribute to better system performance.

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