【Ten Years of Rapid Development in Chemical Equipment】The world’s first upgrade to a light hydrocarbon-based ethylene glycol production process in Lianyungang was successfully commissioned in one go between 2035 and 2026

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This post was last edited by HaiChuanLaoYu on 2026-4-16 07:08. Let’s give praise and encouragement to the achievements made in China’s chemical technology and equipment sector; your participation in discussions is the greatest encouragement. **********************【Ten Years of Progress in Chemical Equipment】A continuously updated summary thread – feel free to join the discussions: https://bbs.hcbbs.com/thread-3576046-1-1.html ***************** Recently, the research team from Changzhou University successfully developed a technology for the hydrogenation and purification of ethylene glycol. This technology was applied in the world’s first large-scale facility for producing polyester-grade ethylene glycol from light hydrocarbons, located in Xuwu New Area, Lianyungang. All key performance indicators exceeded the design standards, meeting the stringent quality requirements for high-end polyester materials. This achievement marks China’s technical level in the field of ethylene glycol refining as being among the best in the world, and it also provides core technical support for the high-end transformation of China’s petrochemical industry. The successful commissioning of the world’s first upgraded facility for producing polyester-grade ethylene glycol from light hydrocarbons represents an important breakthrough by the research team from Changzhou University in serving major strategic goals and the needs of key industries in Jiangsu Province. It is also another achievement for the team in the field of research and industrialization related to ethylene glycol. From being constrained to becoming a leader: A years-long technological struggle. The story dates back to the beginning of this century. At that time, China’s coal-based ethylene glycol production process began to be deployed on a large scale, which was an important strategy for ensuring **energy security. However, an industry-wide challenge persists: trace amounts of unsaturated impurities in the product result in low ultraviolet transmittance, making it difficult for this material to meet the requirements of high-end polyester production. This quality bottleneck once became the \"Achilles’ heel\" restricting the advanced development of China’s coal chemical industry. Faced with this pain point in the industry, a research team led by Researcher Chen Qun from Changzhou University stepped forward to tackle the challenge. Instead of choosing to follow the existing approach, they started with the underlying principles of catalytic materials and innovatively restructured the entire catalyst system, successfully overcoming the key challenge of \"molecular recognition\". The specific adsorption and directed hydrogenation catalysis technology developed by the team functions like a comprehensive network designed to capture impurity molecules; it is capable of precisely detecting and removing aldehyde impurities at the ppm level, while simultaneously preventing side reactions associated with ethylene glycol itself. This breakthrough has completely resolved the long-standing problem of poor quality in coal-based ethylene glycol products, laying a solid technical foundation for China to become the only country in the world to achieve large-scale adoption of this coal-based ethylene glycol production process. Three major breakthroughs set new benchmarks for the industry. After achieving a decisive victory in the field of coal chemical engineering, the research team did not stop its efforts. They turned their attention to the production of ethylene glycol from light hydrocarbons, which involves a shorter process route; this imposes higher requirements on hydrogenation refining technology in terms of longer operation cycles, full capacity operation, and intrinsic safety. The successful application at Lianyungang Petrochemical is the result of the team’s efforts to overcome challenges, achieving a generational leap in three key technologies: a generational leap in catalysts, as the team optimized organic-inorganic hybrid catalytic materials, thereby improving the catalyst’s activity, stability, and lifetime per cycle. This directly addresses the industry challenge of frequent shutdowns and catalyst replacement in large petrochemical plants due to catalyst deactivation, providing a key guarantee for the stable, continuous, efficient, and reliable operation of such plants. A perfect solution to engineering scaling: through collaboration between universities and enterprises, this classic engineering challenge of uneven flow field distribution in drop-bed reactors with a high length-to-diameter ratio was successfully overcome. By innovatively adopting a hydrogen-free circulation process and a multi-stage quenching structure, efficient coordination among the gas, liquid, and solid phases is achieved; this not only ensures high production efficiency but also elevates intrinsic safety to a new level. The full integration of the entire process chain represents the first time in the world that a complete closed-loop process for producing polyester-grade ethylene glycol from light hydrocarbons has been achieved. This success not only verifies the feasibility of the light hydrocarbon route but also demonstrates the versatility and superiority of this technology across various feedstock routes such as the coal-based method, transesterification method, and MTO concentrated water purification method, highlighting its strong advantages as a platform technology.