DATE : 2014-02-10
Indian Oil (New Delhi) is planning to significantly expand its petrochemical business in India, S. Mitra, executive director/petrochemicals tells CW. The company aims to develop its Koyali site through investments in acrylic acid and esters. Meanwhile, a final investment decision on a previously announced polypropylene (PP) investment at Paradip is expected in the “next month or two,” Mitra says.
The PP project will include two lines, each designed to produce 350,000 m.t./year. The project will be based on LyondellBasell Industries’ Spheripol technology and would likely be onstream at the end of 2016, Mitra says. The project would more than double Indian Oil’s PP capacity. The company currently has capacity for 650,000 m.t./year at its Panipat site.
Indian Oil is also planning a number of ethylene-based projects at Paradip. The ethylene is expected to come from an ethylene-recovery project using refinery offgas. The facility, based on the Lummus process, would produce 250,000–300,000 m.t./year of ethylene and be ready in 2018. Indian Oil is studying a number of projects at Paradip based on ethylene from the planned facility. The company is contemplating building a low-density polyethylene (LDPE) plant or an ethyl vinyl acetate/LDPE facility. Other possibilities include units producing styrene, polyvinyl chloride (PVC), and ethylene glycol (EG). There would be enough ethylene for only one of these units, Mitra says. Possible capacities for the units would be 250,000 m.t./year of LDPE; 600,000 m.t./year of styrene; 500,000 m.t./year of PVC; and 400,000 m.t./year of EG. Further into the future, the company is considering a 1-million m.t./year para -xylene ( p -xylene) unit at the site. The company is currently assessing the market for p -xylene.
Meanwhile, at Koyali, Indian Oil is studying a number of projects based on refinery propylene. The company operates a refinery at the site. Indian Oil is constructing a 1-million m.t./year acetic acid plant there in a joint venture with BP. The plant will include associated gasification facilities for the production of synthesis gas.
The acetic acid complex is planned to be onstream in 2017, Mitra says. “We are also looking at the use of propylene for new facilities, including acrylic acid, acrylic esters, and oxo-alcohols,” he tells CW. The acrylic acid plant would be designed to produce 100,000 m.t./year, and the esters unit, producing mainly butyl acrylate, would have capacity for 160,000 m.t./year.
The company is carrying out a feasibility study for the project and, if it proves viable, Indian Oil will look for jv partners, Mitra says.
Indian Oil’s petrochemicals business will be concentrated at three main sites: Panipat, Koyali, and Paradip (p. 19). “Koyali is becoming a major site for Indian Oil, together with Panipat and Paradip,” Mitra says.
SOURCE Chemweek