Honeywell technology selected for largest petchem project in China

MOSCOW (MRC) – Honeywell UOP announced that Zhejiang Petrochemical Co. Ltd. will use four of its Polybed pressure swing adsorption (PSA) units to supply high-purity hydrogen for its new integrated refining and petrochemical complex in Zhoushan, Zhejiang Province, said Hydrocarbonprocessing.

The complex will use Honeywell Experion distributed control systems from Honeywell Process Solutions, and the PSA units will be controlled by Honeywell C300 controllers integrated with the Experion system.

Zhejiang Petrochemical earlier awarded petrochemical process technology licensing, engineering design and catalysts to Honeywell UOP. When completed, the new plant will be the largest crude-to-chemicals complex in China and one of the largest in the world, manufacturing petrochemicals to make plastic resins, films and fibers, as well as fuels.

"Our customers in China are selecting UOP’s PSA technology as an extremely competitive and reliable source of high purity hydrogen,” said John Gugel, vice president and general manager, Gas Processing and Hydrogen at Honeywell UOP. “This is critical because hydrogen is essential to the operation of any refinery or petrochemical plant, and the quality of that hydrogen helps determine the efficiency of the entire complex."
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- MAN Diesel & Turbo has entered a comprehensive cooperation agreement with Mitsui Engineering & Shipbuilding Co., Ltd. that will intensify their existing, joint business activities, as per Hydrocarbonprocessing.

The agreement was signed by Takao Tanaka, President & CEO of Mitsui Engineering & Shipbuilding and Dr. Uwe Lauber, CEO of MAN Diesel & Turbo.

"Together, we will offer a solution portfolio that is unique in today’s market," said Dr. Lauber.

The two companies are longstanding partners, with multiple previous collaborations, and have now agreed to deepen mutual activities within sales, production, R&D, and EPC (engineering, procurement, construction), with the potential for other business fields to be added in the future. The common goal is to enhance mutual business opportunities in a more timely and effective fashion.

"Mitsui Engineering & Shipbuilding and MAN Diesel & Turbo can look back at almost a century of successful cooperation in many fields of business, for example, two- and four-stroke engines for marine and stationary applications," said Tanaka. "With this agreement, we not only consolidate these cooperative efforts, but we also extend them to include the steam turbine and compressor segment."

"Along with the ongoing implementation of our technology in power plants and marine projects, we have also agreed to set a greater focus on our joint R&D efforts," said Dr. Lauber. "Driven by the global trends of decarbonization and digitalization, markets are in transition. We want to continue to combine our strengths to offer propulsion and energy solutions that help our customers to tackle tomorrow’s challenges. This will also include working more closely in the field of Floating Production Storage and Offloading systems (FPSO), as well as steam turbines and compressors-mainly for the Japanese market."

As MRC wrote before, in 2015, Mitsui & Co. announced that Fairway Methanol LLC, a 50-50 joint venture between Mitsui and US-based chemicals company Celanese, had commenced production of methanol at its planned annual production capacity of 1.3 million tons. In addition to access to reliable supplies of affordable gas feedstocks thanks to the US shale revolution, project officials also expect to benefit from the use of existing infrastructure belonging to Celanese situated in Pasadena, Texas.

Mitsui Chemicals is a leading manufacturer and supplier of value added specialty chemicals, plastics and materials for the automotive, healthcare, packaging, agricultural, building, and semiconductor and electronics markets. Mitsui Chemicals is a Japanese Chemicals company, a part of the Mitsui conglomerate. The company has a turnover of around 15 billion USD and has business interests in Japan, Europe, China, Southeast Asia and the USA. The company mainly deals in performance materials, petro and basic chemicals and functional polymeric materials.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- CB&I announced the inauguration of its Novolen technology polypropylene (PP) pilot plant, a new section of its Research and Development (R&D) center in Pasadena, Texas, reported Hydrocarbonprocessing.

The pilot plant will play a key role in the development and commercialization of new products and catalysts, keeping CB&I on the cutting edge of R&D for licensed technology and innovation. The pilot plant will also play an essential role in testing catalyst systems developed in CB&I's laboratories.

"This pilot plant is a complementary investment to our polypropylene catalyst production plant in Louisville, Kentucky," said Philip K. Asherman, CB&I's President and CEO. "It allows us to further partner with our customers to develop new specialty grade PP and positions CB&I to best serve the changing market."

As MRC wrote before, in July 2014, CB&I and Clariant, a world leader in specialty chemicals, announced that their new Ziegler-Natta (ZN) polypropylene catalyst plant in Louisville, Kentucky, which began production in 2015.
MRC

МOSCOW (MRC) -- Petroleo Brasileiro SA will include its Pasadena, Texas refinery and its African assets in a divestment plan, the Brazilian state-controlled oil company said in a Wednesday securities filing, said Reuters.

Petrobras, as the company is known, reaffirmed its target of divesting up to USD21 B in assets by the end of 2018. It currently controls half of divesting African venture Petrobras Oil & Gas BV, or Petrobras Africa.

As MRC informed earlier, Alpek, S.A.B. de C.V. announced that it obtained all necessary corporate approvals to acquire 100% of PetroquimicaSuape and Citepe from Petrobras for USD385 mln.

Headquartered in Rio de Janeiro, Petrobras is an integrated energy firm. Petrobras' activities include exploration, exploitation and production of oil from reservoir wells, shale and other rocks as well as refining, processing, trade and transport of oil and oil products, natural gas and other fluid hydrocarbons, in addition to other energy-related activities.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Royal Dutch Shell on Wednesday urged oil pricing agency S&P Global Platts to protect the dated Brent crude benchmark from declining North Sea supply by including other grades, such as Russian Urals, in its price-setting process, said Reuters.

The suggestion marks a shift from two years ago when Shell said adding Urals would not be "worth the trouble." The benchmark, based on light North Sea crude grades, is used to price about two-thirds of the world's oil but a decline in North Sea output has led to concerns that physical volumes could become too thin and prone to large price swings.

Platts announced it would add a fifth grade, Troll, to the benchmark slate from January 2018 but Shell says more must be added in the next two to three years and considers Russian medium sour Urals as a top candidate.

The benchmark is now made up of Brent, Forties, Oseberg, and Ekofisk, known as BFOE. "A good benchmark need not only be representative of what the region produces ... If you had to pick one grade of crude, Urals is the one which northwest European refineries should be designed to run optimally," Mike Muller, vice president of crude trading and supply at Shell, told the Platts Crude Summit in London.

Muller also suggested the price of dated Brent be derived from the average price of a basket of crudes, rather than by using the lowest priced of the four BFOE crudes on any given day. This would simplify the price-setting process, he said.

Two years ago, Muller said European refineries were already free to buy Urals—a crude stream that dwarfs North Sea streams in volume—as a substitute to the North Sea Forties grades as they are similar in quality.

Muller also called for the formation of a committee of independent experts to consult with Platts and the wider industry on future changes to the benchmark in order to ensure the views of all market players were represented.

Shell is one of the world's largest crude traders and one of the most active players in both the North Sea and Urals markets.

Shell’s North Sea production is set to drop by more than half to about 110,000 bpd after the sale of a large package of North Sea assets to private equity-backed Chrysaor last year. But Shell will market Chrysaor’s volumes for several more years.
MRC