Patent ID: 8197668

Claim:
A process for upgrading steam cracker tar comprising: a) hydroprocessing a resid-containing steam cracker feed; b) heating the hydroprocessed steam cracker feed in an upper convection section of a steam cracker furnace; c) separating the heated feed in a flash drum to provide a bottoms stream and an overhead stream; d) directing the overhead stream to a lower convection section and a radiant section of the steam cracker furnace to provide a steam cracker effluent; e) separating the steam cracker effluent into a steam cracker tar bottoms fraction and at least one lower boiling, olefins-containing fraction; f) visbreaking the steam cracker tar in the presence of an added hydrogen donor-rich hydrocarbon stream that can optionally include at least a portion of the bottoms stream from step c), to provide a product of lower viscosity than the steam cracker tar; g) separating the product of lower viscosity into at least one of: a steam cracker gas oil stream, a tar-lean stream, and a tar-rich stream; and h) optionally blending the tar-lean stream and/or the tar-rich stream into a fuel oil pool to provide a fuel oil product.