ADNOC restarts Ruwais oil refinery after maintenance

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC) has begun a gradual restart of its Ruwais oil refinery complex after a scheduled maintenance shutdown, reported Reuters with reference to a company spokesman's statement on Sunday.

The Ruwais complex, which has capacity of 835,000 barrels per day, was shut down early this year, the ADNOC spokesman said.

"We are gradually restarting our refining operations in Ruwais following our planned maintenance programme," the spokesman told Reuters.

As MRC informed earlier, in late July 2019, ADNOC said its Ruwais refinery west cracker was offline for maintenance.

Ethylene and propylene are feedstocks for producing polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP).

According to MRC's ScanPlast report, Russia's estimated PE consumption totalled 557,060 tonnes in the first three month of 2020, up by 7% year on year. High density polyethylene (HDPE) and linear low density polyethylene (LLDPE) shipments rose because of the increased capacity utilisation at ZapSibNeftekhim. Demand for LDPE subsided. At the same time, PP shipments to the Russian market was 267,630 tonnes in January-March 2020, down 20% year on year. Homopolymer PP and PP block copolymers accounted for the main decrease in imports.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- CNOOC Huizhou Petrochemical Company Limited (CHPCL) has selected Axens’ ParamaX® Technology Suite for its petrochemical complex expansion in Daya Bay, China, said Hydrocarbonprocessing.

The project aims at increasing CHPCL’s high-purity aromatics production capacity to 3,000,000 tons per year. The new aromatics complex will produce 1,500,000 tons per year of para-Xylene in a single train.

Axens offered its second generation of the energy-efficient ParamaX® Suite of technologies for the cost-effective production of para-Xylene, benzene and mixed xylenes from aromatic-rich reformate and pyrolysis gasoline.

The ParamaX® Suite includes the following solutions: o Arofining™ selective olefin removal technology, originally developed by Axens, o Eluxyl® 1.15 para-Xylene purification technology, originally developed by Axens, o XyMaxSM-2, C8 aromatics isomerization technology, originally developed by ExxonMobil Chemical Technology Licensing, o TransPlusSM-5, aromatics transalkylation technology, originally developed by ExxonMobil Chemical Technology Licensing.

Axens’ second generation of the energy-efficient ParamaX® Suite provides superior aromatics yields while greatly reducing the plant’s energy consumption and enabling to manage investments for costadvantaged aromatics production.

Since 2009, CHPCL has been satisfactorily operating an Axens’ ParamaX complex with a production rate exceeding 1,300,000 tons of pure aromatics per year.

Axens’ Process Licensing Global Business Unit Executive Vice-President Patrick Sarrazin said, “This brand-new, state-of-the-art aromatics complex will allow CHPCL to further improve its resilience and competitiveness while producing highly valuable aromatics products.”

Axens will also supply catalysts, adsorbents, equipment and a full-service offer from plant personnel training to successful plant start-up, followed by plant performance monitoring services.

The ParamaX® Technology Suite is a combination of top-of-the-line processes aimed at the production of high-purity para-Xylene and other aromatic molecules such as meta-Xylene, ortho-Xylene, Benzene and Toluene.

To date, Axens has licensed more than 30 ParamaX® aromatics complexes and more than 400 process units aimed at aromatics production or transformation.

As MRC informed earlier, CNOOC Limited reported that its first-quarter oil and gas sales revenue reached around 39.95 billion Chinese yuan, down 5.5 percent from last year, mainly due to the lower realised oil and gas price, despite increased oil and gas sales volume. First-quarter total net production was 131.5 million barrels of oil equivalent or BOE, an increase of 9.5 percent from the prior year. Production from China increased 9.7 percent from last year to 87.1 million BOE. Overseas production grew 9 percent to 44.5 million BOE.

Ethylene and propylene are feedstocks for producing polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP).

According to MRC's ScanPlast report, Russia's estimated PE consumption totalled 383,760 tonnes in the first two month of 2020, up by 14% year on year. High density polyethylene (HDPE) and linear low density polyethylene (LLDPE) shipments increased due to the increased capacity utilisation at ZapSibNeftekhim. At the same time, PP shipments to the Russian market were 192,760 tonnes in January-February 2020, down by 6% year on year. Homopolymer PP accounted for the main decrease in imports.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Shell has deepened its carbon emissions targets promising to become a net-zero emissions energy business by 2050 or sooner as pressure mounts on oil majors to help mitigate climate change, reported S&P Global.

Under the move, Shell said it will reduce the net carbon footprint of the energy products it sells by around 65% by 2050, up from a previous goal of around 50%, and by around 30% by 2035, increased from around 20%.

"Society's expectations have shifted quickly in the debate around climate change. Shell now needs to go further with our own ambitions," CEO Ben van Beurden said in a statement.

Shell said it will track and report on progress in achieving both the aim to reduce the carbon footprint of the energy products it supplies and develop a method for tracking and reporting emissions reduction by its customers.

One of the first international oil and gas companies to set targets for reducing the net carbon footprint of its energy products, Shell in 2017 said it planned to halve the carbon intensity of its energy products by 2050 following a cut of around 20% by 2035 to help meet the goals of the Paris Agreement.

Faced with growing concerns over cliimate change, global oil majors have been stepping up their carbon reduction targets with a focus on laying out pathways to decarbonize large parts of their business by 2050.

In February, UK-based rival BP announced new targets for the oil major to become a "net-zero" carbon emitter by 2050 or sooner, also aiming to halve the carbon intensity of its products by 2050. The "ambitions" cover greenhouse gas emissions from operations and the carbon emitted from the oil and gas it produces on an absolute basis, including the use of carbon "sinks" such as carbon capture and tree planting.

Spain's Repsol has committed to achieving net-zero Scope 3 emissions by 2050, but by using mostly carbon offsets such as tree planting and carbon capture and storage (CCS). Equinor, Shell and Total have all made commitments to improve the emissions intensity of their products.

As MRC wrote before, Royal Dutch Shell said it is planning a major maintenance turnaround at its Pernis oil refinery in the Netherlands starting on May 4, 2020.

We also remind that Shell Singapore restarted its naphtha cracker in Bukom Island this week following a two months maintenance shutdown since the beginning of October 2019. Thus, this cracker was taken off-stream for the turnaround on 1 October 2019. The cracker is able to produce 960,000 tons/year of ethylene and 550,000 tons/year of propylene.

Ethylene and propylene are feedstocks for producing polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP).

According to MRC's ScanPlast report, Russia's estimated PE consumption totalled 557,060 tonnes in the first three month of 2020, up by 7% year on year. High density polyethylene (HDPE) and linear low density polyethylene (LLDPE) shipments rose because of the increased capacity utilisation at ZapSibNeftekhim. Demand for LDPE subsided. At the same time, PP shipments to the Russian market was 267,630 tonnes in January-March 2020, down 20% year on year. Homopolymer PP and PP block copolymers accounted for the main decrease in imports.

Royal Dutch Shell plc is an Anglo-Dutch multinational oil and gas company headquartered in The Hague, Netherlands and with its registered office in London, United Kingdom. It is the biggest company in the world in terms of revenue and one of the six oil and gas "supermajors". Shell is vertically integrated and is active in every area of the oil and gas industry, including exploration and production, refining, distribution and marketing, petrochemicals, power generation and trading.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Pipeline operator Enbridge Inc said it has reached a deal with shippers to temporarily store crude in North America’s largest oil pipeline network, according to a filing, as Canadian producers scramble to respond to weak refinery demand and low prices, reported Reuters.

Enbridge said the agreement would temporarily provide roughly 912,000 barrels of storage on its Canadian Mainline system starting June 1, according to a May 1 filing with the Canadian Energy Regulator.

The Mainline, Canada’s longest oil pipeline system, has capacity for nearly 3 million barrels per day, moving western Canadian oil to US refiners.

As MRC wrote previously, in late December 2019, Enterprise Products Partners and Enbridge agreed to jointly develop a deepwater crude oil export terminal offshore Houston, the latest sign of consolidation in the crowded field of US Gulf Coast export projects.

We also remind that Enterprise Products Partners' Mont Belvieu propane dehydrogenation unit in Texas restarted from planned maintenance in the first week of December, 2019. The PDH unit went offline for maintenance on November 13. That day, the company said in a filing with the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality that the RAC "B" turbine shut down, which resulted in flaring. The flaring was estimated to last 72 hours. The unit has a capacity of 750,000 mt/year, according to Platts data.

Propylene is the main feedstock for producing polypropylene (PP).

According to MRC's ScanPlast report, PP shipments to the Russian market was 267,630 tonnes in January-March 2020, down 20% year on year. Homopolymer PP and PP block copolymers accounted for the main decrease in imports.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Energy major Total has been told by Occidental that it cannot acquire oil and gas assets in Algeria that was part of an USD8.8 billion deal both firms reached over Anadarko’s assets in Africa, reported Reuters.

"Occidental officially told us that we cannot acquire the Algeria assets," the French company’s CEO Patrick Pouyanne told analysts during a conference call after its first quarter 2020 results.

As MRC informed earlier, Total has recently disclosed that it is evaluating construction of a new gas cracker at its Deasan, South Korea, joint venture (JV) with Hanwha Chemical.

Ethylene and propylene are feedstocks for producing polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP).

According to MRC's ScanPlast report, Russia's estimated PE consumption totalled 383,760 tonnes in the first two month of 2020, up by 14% year on year. High density polyethylene (HDPE) and linear low density polyethylene (LLDPE) shipments increased due to the increased capacity utilisation at ZapSibNeftekhim. At the same time, PP shipments to the Russian market were 192,760 tonnes in January-February 2020, down by 6% year on year. Homopolymer PP accounted for the main decrease in imports.

Total S.A. is a French multinational oil and gas company and one of the six "Supermajor" oil companies in the world with business in Europe, the United States, the Middle East and Asia. The company's petrochemical products cover two main groups: base chemicals and the consumer polymers (polyethylene, polypropylene and polystyrene) that are derived from them.
MRC