【Haichuan Chemical News】Domestically developed million-ton-scale ethylene production technology wins industry’s top award

I’m not sure which factories use these domestic complete sets of technical equipment

In 2019, China’s ethylene production capacity was 28.89 million tons per year, with a self-sufficiency rate of 56%. It is estimated that by 2025, this capacity will reach 42 million tons per year, giving a self-sufficiency rate of 66.7%. The development of China’s ethylene industry entails a great demand for advanced ethylene production technologies. However, the introduction of such technology has drawbacks such as poor adaptability to complex raw materials and short operating cycles for the pyrolysis furnaces. Given the availability of petroleum resources in our country and the complexity of ethylene feedstocks, it is of great strategic importance to develop a comprehensive set of technologies for producing ethylene that can efficiently crack light feedstocks such as ethane, light hydrocarbons, and naphtha, as well as heavy feedstocks like diesel and hydrogenation tail oils. Additionally, such technologies should be capable of efficiently cracking unconventional feedstocks with high olefin content. This is essential for enhancing the international competitiveness of China’s petrochemical industry and meeting the needs of national economic development.

To meet the needs of the national economic development, work on the development of ethylene technology was initiated as early as 1983, at the founding of Sinopec Corporation. Over the past 30 years, with the strong support of the relevant ministries, Sinopec’s R&D team for ethylene projects has continued to work hard on this task. They started by focusing on the development of cracking technologies, then proceeded to work on separation technology, ultimately achieving breakthroughs in the entire set of related technologies. Over the past 30 years, 12 research projects have been approved under various **research programs. Sinopec has organized 121 development projects for research and development, of which 10 key projects were included in Sinopec’s major \"Ten Dragon\" projects

The Sinopec Ten-Dragon Plan was introduced previously

To develop the complete set of technologies for ethylene production, the project team established 15 experimental facilities/R&D platforms covering ethylene process research, catalyst research, development of key equipment, and verification of critical technologies, as well as 8 databases. They independently developed 20 models covering the entire ethylene production process, which have been validated in industrial settings, thus laying a solid technical foundation for the development of such complete technology sets. Through more than 30 years of continuous research and development, the project team has successfully developed a million-ton-scale ethylene production technology suite capable of efficiently cracking light feedstocks such as ethane, light hydrocarbons, and naphtha, as well as heavy feedstocks like diesel and hydrogenation tail oil, as well as complex feedstocks with high olefin content. This has enabled China to become the first country to fully master such technology for producing ethylene from complex feedstocks.

Which is the leading design institute for this technology? Is it Lopike?

This set of technological innovations has led to the development of ultra-large-scale, long-cycle, high-efficiency pyrolysis furnace technologies suitable for handling complex feedstocks, overcoming the challenge of achieving both high selectivity and long operational cycles. The largest pyrolysis furnace in China, with an annual capacity of 200,000 tons, has been in operation for 4 years, while the world’s largest furnace, with an annual capacity of 300,000 tons, is now ready for operation. Meanwhile, a new efficient separation process was developed, centered around fractional condensation and distillation towers as well as distribution and separation techniques, which enables high ethylene recovery rates while reducing energy consumption significantly. A series of high-performance catalysts were created for the entire ethylene production process, including those for high-selectivity hydrogenation of C2 and C3 compounds as well as low-temperature, high-speed methanization; the performance of these catalysts exceeds that of similar products available domestically and internationally, and they can be exported. Major equipment for ethylene production at a scale of millions of tons, including pyrolysis gas and propylene refrigeration compressors along with cryogenic tanks, was also developed. Green and efficient specialized technologies were created, and the results of these technological efforts have been exported as well.

The largest pyrolysis unit in China, with a capacity of 200,000 tons per year, has been in operation for 4 years; it belongs to which project? The world’s largest pyrolysis unit, with a capacity of 300,000 tons per year, has been built and is ready for operation. Which project is it?

This set of technologies has also yielded significant intellectual property achievements: a total of 206 patents have been granted, including 157 invention patents (64 of which are abroad); 137 papers have been published, 4 monographs have been written, and 15 standards have been established. This has created a comprehensive technical framework that lays a solid foundation for the rapid development of related technologies in the future. The complete set of technologies for producing ethylene on a million-ton scale from complex raw materials has been widely adopted and applied. Following the successful construction and commissioning of the 800,000-ton/year ethylene plant at Wuhan Sino-Korean Petrochemical, the 800,000-ton/year ethylene plant at Zhanjiang Zhongke Petrochemical was completed at the end of December 2019 and is about to start up for trial operation. A number of other ethylene plants with capacities of millions of tons per year, utilizing complex feedstocks, are currently in the design or construction phase, including the 900,000-ton/year ethylene plant at Fujian Gulei, the 1,000,000-ton/year ethylene plant at Hainan Petrochemical, and the 1,200,000-ton/year ethylene plant at Zhenhai Petrochemical. In addition to new installations, renovation and expansion projects for million-ton-scale ethylene plants such as Fujian United Petrochemical have also been completed.

The complete set of technologies for producing ethylene on a million-ton scale from complex raw materials was approved by the China Petroleum and Chemical Industry Federation in 2018, and it received the Special Prize for Scientific and Technological Progress from the same federation in 2019. The research, development, and industrial application of this technology package have driven technological progress in China’s ethylene industry, supported its rapid development, and strongly promoted the growth of China’s petrochemical industry, equipment manufacturing sector, and related industries, yielding significant economic and social benefits; it represents a milestone in this field. Source: China Chemical Industry News