MOSCOW (MRC) -- Dow and Shell say they have teamed up to accelerate the development of technology that can potentially electrify steam crackers, said Chemweek.
The two companies say project teams in Amsterdam and Terneuzen, Netherlands, and in Texas, are collaborating under a joint development agreement on the conceptual design and scaling of “e-cracker” technologies. Current steam crackers rely on fossil fuel combustion to heat their furnaces, making them CO2 intensive, the companies say. “As the energy grid becomes increasingly renewables-led, using renewable electricity to heat steam cracker furnaces could become one of the routes to decarbonize the chemicals industry. The challenge is to develop a technologically and economically feasible solution,” they say. Shell and Dow will first work on proving out process technology innovations in laboratory and pilot operations, and then scale up to commercial crackers.
"Significant technological breakthroughs are needed to reduce our industry’s energy use and greenhouse gas emissions, which will require companies to step out of their comfort zones and work together to achieve bold and ambitious new goals. Our partnership with Shell is an important step in making this vision a reality,” says Keith Cleason, Dow’s vice president/olefins, aromatics, and alternatives business.
The work "has the potential to contribute to the reduction of carbon emissions from the manufacture of chemicals and to Shell’s ambition of becoming a net-zero emissions energy business by 2050 or sooner," says Thomas Casparie, executive vice president/global chemicals at Shell.
As MRC informed earlier, in mid-May 2020, USA based Dow Chemical announced plans to shut three polyethylene (PE) plants in the USA and Argentina to avoid piling inventories amid sluggish global demand conditions due to the COVID-19 related lockdown.
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.
The Dow Chemical Company is an American multinational chemical corporation headquartered in Midland, Michigan, United States. Dow is a large producer of plastics, including polystyrene (PS), polyurethane, polyethylene, polypropylene, and synthetic rubber.
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