Thread Content
On September 16, the Hunan Provincial Development and Reform Commission issued a approval notice to Sinopec Hunan Petrochemical Co., Ltd. (Hunan Petrochemical) regarding the 1 million tons per year ethylene refining and chemical processing integrated project along with the associated oil refining upgrades in the Yueyang area. This marks the official approval for the construction of this project. The total investment for this project is 35.68 billion yuan, of which 31.08 billion yuan is allocated to the ethylene refining and chemical integration facility with an annual production capacity of 1 million tons, while 4.6 billion yuan is invested in the upgrades required for the oil refining operations. The approval states that, in accordance with **relevant planning and layout guidelines, construction of a 1 million tons per year ethylene refining and chemical processing integrated facility along with related refinery upgrades in the Yueyang area is approved. The entity responsible for building this facility is Sinopec Hunan Petrochemical Co., Ltd. (Hunan Petrochemical). The ethylene refining and processing integration section includes the construction of 14 chemical processing units, such as one unit for producing 1 million tons per year of ethylene and another for hydrogenating 500,000 tons per year of pyrolysis gasoline, along with the necessary supporting utility systems. The project will be built in the Hunan Yueyang Green Chemical High-Tech Industrial Development Zone ； The refinery upgrade projects include the construction of a new hydrocracking complex with an annual capacity of 3 million tons, a sulfur recovery unit with an annual capacity of 60,000 tons, and a solvent deasphalting unit with an annual capacity of 1 million tons, along with the necessary utility systems. Unit 2’s atmospheric and vacuum distillation capacity will be increased to 10 million tons per year, while the existing 3.5 million ton per year refining units at Changling Refining and Balin Petrochemical will be phased out. The approval requires that the 1 million tons per year ethylene refining and chemical integration project, along with the associated oil refining upgrades in the Yueyang area of Sinopec, follow the principle of \"reducing oil production and increasing chemical production,\" further optimize the process technical solutions, enhance the mutual supply of materials between this project and the enterprises located in the surrounding chemical industrial park, and promote coordinated and complementary development of the industry. In principle, autonomous technical equipment, industrial software, and control systems should be selected to improve the degree of autonomy of the installations. It is necessary to increase investment in innovation, and develop and produce products that are in short supply domestically, following a strategy of high-end development and differentiation. With the high attention of the Party leadership group of Sinopec Group and the guidance of various departments at its headquarters, at the beginning of 2021, Sinopec’s enterprises in Hunan Province, namely Balin Petrochemical and Changling Refining & Chemical, put forward a plan to \"promote development through reform, and use development to drive further reform, in order to accelerate the integrated development of ethylene refining and chemical production in the Yueyang area.\" Subsequently, Hunan Province and Sinopec reached a firm consensus on providing full support for the ethylene refining and chemical integration project in the Yueyang area. In October 2021, work began on preparing the project feasibility study report. In July 2022, Sinopec approved the project’s feasibility study report; in October of the same year, the National Development and Reform Commission and the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology responded to Hunan Province and Sinopec, agreeing to include the project among the reserve projects under the **Petrochemical Industry Planning and Layout Plan**. Recently, at the request of the Industry Department of the **National Development and Reform Commission, the office of the working group responsible for implementing the \"Petroleum and Chemical Industry Planning Layout Plan\" organized experts to hold an expert evaluation meeting on the conversion of the ethylene project reserves in the Yueyang area of China Petrochemicals into formal plans. The experts present agreed that the plan for the Yueyang ethylene project is scientific and feasible; it plays an important role in stabilizing the industrial and supply chains, increasing effective investment, and sustaining economic growth. The preliminary preparations have been thorough, and the project is now ready to be moved from the reserve stage to the planning phase. **The National Development and Reform Commission replied in agreement to convert this project from a reserve project to a planned project.