FOCUS downstream petrochemicals business and support the delivery of ADNOC’s integrated smart growth and partnership strategy. Earlier in Jul 2017, ADNOC announced the expansion of its strategic partnership model to span the Group’s entire value chain as well as the more active management of its portfolio of assets. This new initiative builds on ADNOC’s flexible operating model and its 2030 growth strategy. It will enable ADNOC to unlock and maximize significant value from across the Group, drive business and revenue growth, optimize performance, improve technology transfer, and secure greater access for its products in key growth markets. Under the agreement, ADNOC and Borealis will move to the pre-feed (front end engineering and design) stage for the construction of the Borouge 4 complex, which encompasses a world-scale, mixed feedstock cracker, using existing feedstock available in Abu Dhabi and downstream derivatives units for both polyolefin and nonpolyolefin products. The proposed Borouge 4 complex is slated to come on stream around 2023 and will be integrated with ADNOC’s Takreer refinery. Simultaneously, the companies have agreed to commence engineering, procurement & construction (EPC) tendering for an additional polypropylene plant (PP5) based on Borealis proprietary Borstar technology. The plant, to be integrated with the existing Borouge 3 complex, will add value to the surplus propylene available from Takreer’s new Propane DeHydrogenation (PDH) unit, producing around 0.5 M tonnes/y of polypropylene. The framework agreement also identifies that ADNOC and Borealis will review the extension of their successful Borouge joint venture beyond its first 30-year lifetime. As part of its 2030 strategy, ADNOC aims to expand petrochemical production from 4.5 M tonnes/y to 11.4 M tonnes/y by 2025.
Original Source: Borealis, 16 Jul 2017, (Website: http://www.borealisgroup.com/) ã Borealis AG 2017.
ExxonMobil and University of Wisconsin-Madison to advance research into conversion of biomass into transportation fuel The University of Wisconsin-Madison and ExxonMobil have announced a two-year renewal of an agreement to research the fundamental chemistry of converting biomass into transportation fuels. The research is part of a broad effort to identify scalable and commercially viable solutions to help meet increasing global energy demand with a renewable resource. Another potential process that will be studied in this collaboration involves the catalytic transformation of bio-derived ethanol into bio-derived diesel and jet fuel. Ethanol is currently produced from a range of sources and is widely used as an additive to gasoline. This technology could potentially allow larger diesel and jet fuel molecules to be produced from renewable sources. The
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research continues to focus on non-food sources like corn stover and other cellulosic feedstocks.
Original Source: ExxonMobil, 17 Jul 2017, (Website: http://www.exxonmobil.com/) ã ExxonMobil Mobil Corporation 2017.
NEW PLANTS Verdezyne groundbreaking ceremony in Malaysia commemorates initiation of the worlds first biobased DDDA plant Verdezyne Inc, a synthetic biology company producing biobased chemicals, announced that a groundbreaking ceremony was held on 30 Jul 2017 for its VerdePalm plant, Verdezyne’s first commercial-scale renewable chemicals manufacturing facility, at the Bio-XCell premier biotechnology and ecosystem park in Nusajaya, Iskandar, in southern Malaysia. The new facility is designed to produce biobased long chain diacids via fermentation of Verdezyne’s proprietary yeast, which has been engineered to use non-food biomass to produce high value chemicals. The first product produced at VerdePalm will be dodecanedioic acid (DDDA), a 12-carbon diacid that is a component of many consumer products currently made from petroleum. DDDA is a main building block of FerroShield, Verdezyne’s nitrate-free dibasic acid mixture used in a variety of corrosion inhibitor applications.
IndianOil & LanzaTech to build “first” refinery off gas-to-bioethanol plant Indian Oil Corp (IndianOil) and LanzaTech have signed a Statement of Intent to construct the “world’s first” bioethanol production facility from refinery off-gases in India. LanzaTech has developed a gas fermentation process that uses a biological catalyst to ferment waste gas emissions. It allows refineries to divert waste gases from the grid, supporting the transition to fully renewable power, while recycling this carbon into liquid fuels and petrochemicals. Basic engineering for a 35,000 tonnes/y demonstration facility will begin in late 2017 for installation at IndianOil’s Panipat refinery in Haryana. The estimated $55 M project will be integrated into existing site infrastructure and will be LanzaTech’s first project capturing refinery off-gases. The ethanol produced from the recycling of refinery off-gases is expected to have a greenhouse gas emissions savings of over 70% compared to conventional gasoline.
Original Source: PetroChemical News, 17 Jul 2017, 55 (28), 3 (Website: http://www. petrochemical-news.com) ã William F. Bland Co. 2017.
Honeywell to provide detergent manufacturing technologies to Farabi Petrochemical complex in Saudi Arabia
OCSiAl will invest s80-100 M to construct a 250 tonnes/y single wall carbon nanotubes (SWCNTs) facility in Differdange, Luxembourg. Back by the country’s Finance and Economy Ministries, the plant is claimed to the largest worldwide. The unit will include a centre for applied nanotechnology that will specially develop elastomer, composite and thermoplastic materials. OCSiAl offers Tuball branded SWCNTs. The firm claims to be the only firm approved to manufacture and commercialize SWCNTs in Europe at industrial scale. It reportedly accounts for 90% of the SWCNT market globally. The company currently has 10 tonnes/y of capacity in Novosibirsk, Russia that is intended to be expanded to 160 tonnes/y in 2020.
Honeywell announced in July that Farabi Petrochemicals Company will use Honeywell UOP technologies for a new complex in Yanbu, Saudi Arabia to expand its production of biodegradable detergents. The construction of the new complex is expected to be completed in 2020. As part of the contract, Honeywell UOP will provide catalysts and adsorbents as well as licensing, basic engineering design and other associated services for the new complex. Honeywell UOP technologies include a Unionfining hydrotreating unit, a Molex unit to produce the linear alkylbenzene (LAB) feedstock necessary for making biodegradable detergents, a Pacol unit for dehydrogenation, a DeFine unit to improve product purity, and a Detal detergent alkylation unit. When completed, the Yanbu complex will produce more than 120,000 tonnes/y of LAB and 246,000 tonnes/y of normal paraffins, in addition to de-aromatized speciality oils, asphalt, sulfonates, mining chemicals, process oils and lubes. As a feedstock, the complex will use diesel from the Saudi Aramco refinery and kerosene from the Saudi Aramco-ExxonMobil refinery in Yanbu.
Original Source: Compounding World, Aug 2017, 6 (Website: http://www.amiplastics.com/ mags) ã Applied Market Information Ltd 2017.
Original Source: Honeywell, 17 Jul 2017, (Website: http://honeywell.com/) ã Honeywell International Inc. 2017.
Source: Verdezyne, 2017. Found on PR Newswire, 31 Jul 2017, (Website: http://www. prnewswire.com).
OCSiAl to invest s80 M in SWCNT production
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