【HaiChuan Chemical Project Updates】Zhanjiang Zhongjie plans to invest 500 million yuan to build a 50,000-ton/year α-olefins production facility
Thread Content
On April 19, the environmental impact assessment application for Zhanjiang Zhongjie Jingchuang New Materials Technology Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as “Zhanjiang Zhongjie Jingchuang Company”)’s project to produce 50,000 tons of α-olefins, 100,000 tons of POE, and 200,000 tons of lithium-ion electrolytes on Donghai Island was accepted. At the same time, the People’s Government of Zhanjiang City released the environmental impact assessment report for this project (Phase 1). It is learned that the main details are as follows: Project name: Phase I of the Donghai Island project to produce 50,000 tons per year of α-olefins, 100,000 tons per year of POE, and 200,000 tons per year of lithium-ion electrolytes (50,000 tons per year of α-olefins as part of this phase). Project nature: Expansion. Constructor: Zhanjiang Zhongjie Jingchuang Company. Location of construction: Donghai Island Petrochemical Industrial Park, Zhanjiang Development Zone. Construction contents: Zhanjiang Zhongjie Jingchuang Company plans to use the ethylene produced by the Zhanjiang Zhongke project as raw material. The main construction elements include a facility for producing 50,000 tons per year of α-olefins (including a unit for evaluating the applications of 1-octene), a facility for producing 100,000 tons per year of POE, and a facility for producing 200,000 tons per year of lithium-ion electrolytes. Additionally, supporting facilities such as tank areas, warehouses, utility systems, and control rooms will be built. This project is its first phase, and it also represents the second phase of construction by Zhanjiang Zhongjie Jingchuang Company within the Donghai Island Petrochemical Industrial Park, following the “120,000 tons per year electronic new materials project” (hereinafter referred to as “Zhongjie Jingchuang Phase 1 project”). Therefore, this project is also simply referred to as “Zhanjiang Zhongjie Jingchuang Phase 2 project”. The project to produce 10,000 tons of α-olefins per year, 100,000 tons of POE, and 200,000 tons of lithium-ion electrolytes over a period of 5 years has a total investment of 3,107,680,000 yuan. The first phase of this project, as assessed under environmental regulations, has a total investment of 511,350,000 yuan; it involves the construction of a facility capable of producing 50,000 tons of α-olefins per year, as well as a facility for evaluating the applications of 1-octene at a rate of 1,000 tons per year. This project also falls under the Zhanjiang Zhongjie Precision Manufacturing Phase II initiative. The total investment for this phase is 511,350,000 yuan, of which 19,450,000 yuan is allocated to environmental protection measures (accounting for 3.80% of the total investment). Recent developments: In November 2022, the energy-saving report for Zhanjiang Zhongjie Jingchuang Company’s “50,000 tons of α-olefins, 100,000 tons of POE, and 200,000 tons of lithium-ion electrolyte project” was approved. On June 26 of the same year, a signing ceremony for the project was held.
The 13th Five-Year Development Plan for the petrochemical industry specifies that the development of the new materials sector should be advanced from four aspects; the third aspect involves eliminating bottlenecks in the supply of key raw materials used in upstream processes, accelerating research and development of high-carbon α-olefin comonomers such as hexene-1 and octene-1, and promoting the industrialization of high-performance polyolefins. Currently, HDPE and LLDPE products in the world are mainly copolymers of butene-1, hexene-1, or octene-1. Compared with LLDPE produced as a copolymer of butene-1, LLDPE manufactured using hexene-1 and octene-1 as comonomers exhibits significant improvements in tensile strength, impact strength, and tear strength. Taking film products as an example, film products made from hexene-1 and octene-1 copolymerized materials outperform LLDPE resins produced using butene-1 as a comonomer in many aspects such as tensile strength, impact strength, tear strength, puncture resistance, and resistance to environmental stress cracking. Therefore, the industry tends to use 1-hexene and 1-octene instead of 1-butene. In the rapidly developing metallocene polyethylene in recent years, butylene-1 has been entirely eliminated; instead, hexene-1 and octene-1 are used as comonomers to produce polyethylene products with a higher monomer content and superior properties. Generally speaking, in α-olefin/ethylene copolymers, when the α-olefin content is less than 20%, it is PE, and when it is greater than 20%, it is POE. POE is a random copolymer prepared by the catalytic polymerization of ethylene with hexene or octene using metallocene catalysts. The introduction of copolymer monomers reduces the order of the polyethylene segments, leading to a decrease in their crystallinity; this in turn confers good elasticity and excellent transparency to POE ； At the same time, the POE molecules contain a certain amount of crystalline polyethylene phase, which can serve as physical cross-linking points to bear loads, endowing them with excellent thermoplasticity. Currently, POE is widely used in fields such as automotive parts, photovoltaic films, wires and cables, mechanical tools, household items, toys, entertainment and sports goods, shoe soles, seals, and hot melt adhesives.
There are three major barriers to the localization of POE. POE generally refers to ethylene-octene copolymer elastomers with an octene content of over 20%; it has a wide range of applications in various industries, and the barriers to its production are relatively high. Currently, the POE synthesis technology primarily relies on solution polymerization processes. Foreign countries hold a large number of patents in the areas of catalysts and polymerization processes, and the related core technologies are not transferred to others. Domestic universities and research institutions have conducted studies on POE synthesis technology, developing metallocene catalysts and non-metallocene organometallic catalysts with high copolymerization capabilities, but the final step toward industrialization has not yet been achieved. There are three key aspects related to the commercialization of POE: the first is the catalyst; the development status and suitability of metallocene catalysts are the most critical issues. Due to the relative confidentiality surrounding catalysts at present, most domestic production facilities use foreign catalysts in their research efforts, whether for testing or industrial production, and only gradually develop their own catalysts over time. At present, the research and development of metallocene catalysts and their catalytic products in China relies mainly on entities such as China National Petroleum Corporation and the Institute of Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences. Most private enterprises outside the Sinopec system also have research institutes and research frameworks; they improve their capabilities through the purchase of foreign catalysts, combined with their own technical expertise. The second is α-olefins, which account for about 60% of the profits in the POE industry chain. The α-olefin raw materials required for POE mainly refer to octene, C8, and other such materials. Due to foreign companies’ technological blockade on linear α-olefins and high fees for technology transfer, China is forced to import large amounts of high-carbon α-olefins from abroad every year. However, according to statistics, the vast majority of domestic manufacturers that plan to produce POE currently have the capacity to produce α-olefins; their technology is sound, allowing them to start production of POE simultaneously or at a different time. Breaking it down, in the future, POE in China might be divided into POE with carbon content of 4 and POE with carbon content of 8 (currently, most of the planned production capacity for alpha-olefins is for carbon content of 8). Third is the POE process package. Currently, Dow’s first-generation patents are coming to an end, and through research conducted by domestic research institutes and universities on the POE process, along with the expiration of foreign patents, this technology can be put into use; therefore, there are basically no issues with the POE process. Ranked from highest to lowest difficulty, they are catalysts, α-olefins, and POE polymerization. At present, breakthroughs in technology have been achieved in China for the latter two parts, while technical challenges remain in the area of catalysts.
【Ten Years of Great Progress in Chemical Technology】024-2023 Catalytic Technology for the Production of Advanced Linear α-Olefins via Ethylene Oligomerization https://bbs.hcbbs.com/thread-3598257-1-1.html (Source: Huahai Chuanliu – Haichuan Network)
【HaiChuan Equipment Guessing Game】What device is the three-story cylinder? https://bbs.hcbbs.com/thread-3596401-1-1.html (Source: Huahai Chuanliu – HaiChuan Network)