Every five years since 1955, the Chinese government has prepared its ‘Five Year Plan’ for the country’s economy over the coming half decade. This year, the 14th Five Year Plan is being drafted, and given the influence of the Chinese economy over the global chemical sector, its conclusions will be eagerly awaited.
Undegassed molten sulphur can contain several hundred ppmw H2 S. If the headspace in the storage tank is stagnant, the H2 S can accumulate in the vapour space above undegassed liquid sulphur to dangerous levels. Sweeping and blanketing systems are commonly applied to manage the explosion risk in the headspace of molten sulphur storage tanks. D. J. Sachde , C. M. Beitler , K. E. McIntush , and K. S. Fisher of Trimeric Corporation review these approaches, outlining the benefits and limitations, design considerations, and industry experience/guidance for each approach. Calculation methods for natural draft flow of sweep air are also presented.
For the protection of nozzles in sulphur forming plants it is important to prevent larger particles from entering the forming machinery and possibly blocking the nozzles. In normal operation, pipeline strainers are used. Sulphurnet has designed a new system which is suitable for continuous or batch operations and has lower maintenance costs. J. Hermans of Sulphurnet introduces the self-cleaning sulphur strainer.
G. Bowerbank and W. Blas of Shell Catalysts & Technologies discuss low cost strategies to maximise value at existing gas processing facilities. Changing solvents, introducing advanced column internals or a combination of both are relatively simple and cost-effective options for boosting production or revenue with minimal investment.
An advanced mecaptan removal process has been developed and implemented by RATE. The RATE-Oximer process is an oxidative air-based regeneration process, designed to remove mercaptans from liquid and vapour phases. M. Rameshini of RATE describes the key features of the process and its applications.
Spanish fertilizer producer Fertiberia is teaming up with energy firm Iberdrola to build Europe’s largest plant for generating green hydrogen for industrial use – in this case ammonia production. The 100MW solar plant and accompanying 20 MWh lithium-ion battery system and 20MW electrolytic hydrogen production system will be built at a cost of $174 million, and electrolyse water to produce 720 t/a of hydrogen. When fed into Fertiberia’s existing ammonia plant at Puertollano, 250km south of Madrid, the hydrogen will allow a 10% reduction in natural gas use by the plant, saving the company 39,000 t/a in annual CO 2 emissions. Start-up is planned for 2021. Fertiberia will also use electrolysis-generated oxygen as a raw material for nitric acid, which is used to produce ammonium nitrate at the site.
TechnipFMC’s EARTH ® technology, with its structured catalyst jointly developed by TechnipFMC and Clariant, has been proven to be a cost effective way to drastically improve productivity and energy efficiency of the steam reforming process, while reducing the CO 2 footprint per unit hydrogen and syngas product. The technology can be applied in projects to increase the capacity of ammonia and methanol plants and allows significant reduction of greenhouse gas emissions. S. Walspurger of Technip Benelux B.V. and S. Gebert of Clariant GmbH report on the EARTH ® technology and its applications.
Johnson Matthey (JM) has been selected by China’s Ningxia Baofeng Energy Group as licensor for a third methanol synthesis plant at their coal to olefins complex near Yinchuan in Ningxia province. With a planned capacity of 7,200 t/d (2.4 million t/a), the unit will be the largest single train methanol plant in the world once completed.
Falling costs for production of hydrogen by electrolysis are encouraging more serious consideration of using recovered carbon dioxide as a feedstock for chemicals and even fuels production.
Fugitive dust emissions during the handling and storage of formed sulphur can result in negative environmental impacts and under specific conditions result in an explosion hazard. Enersul has developed a dust suppression system specifically targeted at controlling sulphur dust particles. The Enersul SafeFoam Transfer System (STS) reduces sulphur fines at critical transfer points throughout any sulphur handling system, resulting in a significantly safer and more environmentally friendly sulphur handling system.