MOSCOW (MRC) -- ExxonMobil Chemical Company has announced that it has started construction of a multi-billion dollar ethane cracker at its Baytown, Texas, complex and associated premium product facilities in nearby Mont Belvieu, as per the company's statement.
The steam cracker will have a capacity of up to 1.5 million tons per year and provide ethylene feedstock for downstream chemical processing, including processing at two new 650,000 tons per year high performance polyethylene lines at the company’s Mont Belvieu plastics plant.
"The project is made possible in large part by abundant, affordable supplies of US natural gas for energy and chemical feedstock," said Steve Pryor, president of ExxonMobil Chemical Company. The chemical industry and other industrial sectors account for nearly 30% of US natural gas demand. "Shale development has provided US chemical producers a double benefit as an energy source and as a key raw material to make plastics and other essential products, creating jobs and economic activity across the value chain."
The project will employ about 10,000 construction workers, create 4,000 related jobs in nearby Houston communities and add 350 permanent positions at the Baytown complex. It is expected to increase regional economic activity by roughly USD870 million per year and generate more than USD90 million per year in additional tax revenues for local communities.
Contracts have been awarded for construction, which will begin immediately. Contracts have been awarded to Linde Engineering North America, Inc. and Bechtel Oil, Gas, and Chemicals, Inc. to build olefins recovery units at the ExxonMobil Baytown Olefins Plant. Mitsui Engineering & Shipbuilding Co, Ltd. and Huertey Petrochem S.A. will construct the new olefins furnaces. At the Mont Belvieu Plastics Plant, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries will construct two 650,000 tons-per-year high-performance polyethylene lines. Jacobs Engineering, Ltd. will oversee enabling works and interconnections at both locations. Dashiell Corporation and Wood Group Mustang will provide specialty contracting services.
The expansion, coupled with ExxonMobil’s global sales and technology support network, enables ExxonMobil Chemical to economically supply a rapidly growing demand for high-value polyethylene products. These premium products deliver sustainability benefits such as lighter packaging weight, lower energy consumption, and reduced emissions. ExxonMobil Chemical estimates exports could increase significantly as a result of the expansion. Production of these high-quality petrochemical products used in a wide range of consumer and industrial applications is expected to start in 2017.
To support the project’s need for skilled workers, ExxonMobil has committed USD1 million to the Community College Petrochemical Initiative, a training program offered by nine Houston-area community colleges to provide technical skills to high school graduates, returning military veterans and others. This program will involve 50,000 students and educators over the next five years.
As MRC informed earlier, ExxonMobil’s chemical plant in Singapore has been producing ethylene from the facility’s second world-scale steam cracker since mid-2013. The expansion is integrated with the existing petrochemical plants. Thus, the petrochemical complex, powered by a 375-megawatt cogeneration plant, increased production at its three polyethylene plants, two polypropylene plants, a specialty metallocene elastomers unit and the expanded oxo-alcohol and aromatics units.
ExxonMobil is the largest non-government owned company in the energy industry and produces about 3% of the world's oil and about 2% of the world's energy.
MRC