MOSCOW (MRC) -- Shell Chemicals has confirmed that investments at its Wesseling plant in Germany have improved energy efficiency and boosted production volumes. Modifications to furnaces, compressors and column systems, tubes and pipes have lowered stack temperatures and reduced fuel consumption. The upgraded 2A steam cracker can now produce 15% more ethylene, propylene, C4 and pygas, reported GV.
"This project stemmed from Shell Chemicals’ strategy to strengthen refining-chemicals integration and the feedstock position of our core manufacturing locations across the world,” said Graham van’t Hoff, Executive Vice President of Shell Chemicals. “It has made our Wesseling facility even more robust and competitive than before."
In late 2011, Shell Chemicals rationalised its assets at the Wesseling site - closing its 2B cracker - and directed efforts to increase throughput and improve feedstock flexibility at the 2A cracker, which produces ‘building-block’ petrochemicals. It is strategically located on the same site as Shell’s Rheinland refinery - the largest in Germany - which supplies the cracker with advantaged feedstock and absorbs by-product streams.
The steam cracker converts a variety of feedstocks to make ethylene, propylene, heavy olefins and aromatic feed for benzene and toluene production. The site also produces methanol. These are used to make numerous end-products, including packaging, carrier bags, trash liners, injection moulding, pipe extrusion, wire and cable sheathing and insulation.
As MRC wrote before, Royal Dutch Shell has recently completed a revamp and upgrade of its Singapore ethane cracker. The project increased production for the 800,000-tpy ethylene plant on Bukom Island by 20%. The ethylene and olefins unit is also integrated with Shell’s 500,000-bpd refinery.
Royal Dutch Shell plc is an Anglo-Dutch multinational oil and gas company headquartered in The Hague, Netherlands and with its registered office in London, United Kingdom. It is the biggest company in the world in terms of revenue and one of the six oil and gas "supermajors". Shell is vertically integrated and is active in every area of the oil and gas industry, including exploration and production, refining, distribution and marketing, petrochemicals, power generation and trading.
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