Joint venture completes construction scope of work on Sasol Project

MOSCOW (MRC) -- TechnipFMC, in joint venture with Fluor, announced it has safely completed its engineering, procurement and construction management (EPCM) services on Sasol’s world-scale petrochemical complex in Westlake, Louisiana, reported Hydrocarbonprocessing.

As planned, TechnipFMC/Fluor resources will provide assistance to the Sasol team at the LCCP project site for the remaining activities, working with Sasol in parallel on the transition plans for each unit and workstream. TechnipFMC/Fluor will also assist in performance testing for LCCP.

The TechnipFMC and Fluor joint venture has provided EPCM services since the project FID in 2014. The complex features a 1.5-million-ton-per-year ethane cracker based on TechnipFMC’s proprietary ethylene technology which is the technology selected for more than 60% of all new ethylene crackers installed worldwide in the last decade. The Lake Charles Chemical’s Project (LCCP) complex also includes six downstream chemical units and associated utilities, infrastructure and offsites. Sasol announced the beneficial operation on the 470 ktpa polyethylene unit on February 13, which is one of the two polyethylene derivative units at LCCP.

In addition to the work at the complex, TechnipFMC and Fluor also invested in the local community, contributing more than USD185,000 to local schools and organizations throughout the course of the project.

Beginning in November 2018, TechnipFMC/Fluor commenced incremental transitions of assets to Sasol upon completion of each unit or system.

Nello Uccelletti, President of TechnipFMC’s Onshore/Offshore business, stated: "Reaching this achievement at the LCCP is the culmination of more than 4 years of work that was safely accomplished under our management. We are pleased with the project delivery and the successful handover to Sasol."

As MRC reported earlier, in July 2018, Honeywell announced that Secunda Synfuels Operations, an operating division of Sasol South Africa Ltd., will use a Honeywell Connected Plant service to monitor the operating reliability of its two Honeywell UOP CCR Platforming units at its refinery in Secunda, South Africa.
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MOSCOW (MRC) -- Evonik is unveiling TAeTTOOz, a new material technology for printable batteries, at the LOPEC trade show, said the company.

TAeTTOOz has been developed on the basis of what are known as redox polymers by Creavis, the strategic innovation unit of Evonik.

The new materials can be processed by conventional printing methods into very thin, flexible battery cells, thus giving the developer a high degree of design freedom. They allow storage of electrical energy without the need for metals or metal compounds. Battery cells produced with the TAeTTOOz® technology do not require liquid electrolytes and therefore cannot leak. Creavis is now seeking development partners to integrate the TAeTTOOz® technology into new and existing applications.

Dr. Michael Korell, who is responsible at Evonik for the development of TAeTTOOz, said: "We have developed a technology with enormous potential. It enables us to offer a solution to power small electronic circuits with printed batteries efficiently, reliably, and in an ecofriendly way."

The TAeTTOOz technology opens up new possibilities particularly in the spreading networking of everyday objects, the Internet of Things. When ready for series production it can be used in many areas. Medical sensors for monitoring vital functions could be worn far more conveniently when printed batteries are used. In the area of logistics, intelligent sensors operated by printed batteries in packaging could monitor sensitive goods such as food or vaccines.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Mexico's state-run Pemex could delay a call to energy companies to form joint ventures planned for October, amid government complaints that these firms have not invested quickly enough to make good on the promises of the country's flagship reform, reported Hydrocarbonprocessing with reference to the energy secretary.

Pemex so far has had mixed results in its strategy of finding foreign partners to form joint ventures. In 2016, BHP Group was chosen to partner with Pemex in the country's flagship offshore project Trion. But some later auctions failed to attract oil companies and others were delayed.

Oil firms have only invested USD800 million out of billions of dollars committed to over a hundred new Mexican energy projects, Rocio Nahle told journalists at the end of a meeting with the U.S. and Canadian energy secretaries at CERAWeek by IHS Markit conference in Houston.

"They must comply with what the law says in terms of timelines, otherwise they will have to return (licenses and contracts)," Nahle said.

Mexico's government is under pressure to boost the country's oil output and strengthen Pemex following a long-standing production decline that reduced the oil firm's crude output to 1.62 million barrels per day (bpd) in January, below the 2019 target. Crude exports were 1.07 million bpd.

Pemex pumps almost all oil barrels produced in the country, but following the country's opening of its energy markets, authorities expect foreign firms to contribute with more barrels as fast as possible to ease the energy trade deficit.

"Pemex has its own project of drilling 116 wells. As that project develops, it will decide if farmouts (joint ventures between Pemex and foreign partners) will be called this year or next," the secretary added.

Low refining rates increasingly also are forcing Pemex to import over 800,000 bpd of gasoline and other refined products, according to official data, even as the government strives to minimize fuel theft.

As MRC wrote previously, Mexican national oil company Pemex is currently processing about 9 percent more crude oil at its domestic refineries than it did in 2017, said Chief Executive Officer Carlos Trevino in April 2018.

Pemex, Mexican Petroleum, is a Mexican state-owned petroleum company. Pemex has a total asset worth of USD415.75 billion, and is the world's second largest non-publicly listed company by total market value, and Latin America's second largest enterprise by annual revenue as of 2009. Company produces such polymers, as polyethylene (PE), polypropylene (PP), polystyrene (PS).
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Total and several partners along the construction value chain have decided to associate to form the Clean Site Circular Project which aims at recycling natural shrink hoods wastes from the construction sector in closed system without film performances degradation, as per the company's press release.

Shrink hoods are films used for protection and stabilization of goods during storage and transport on pallets.

It has already been demonstrated that a closed loop ‘shrink hood to shrink hood’ is industrially feasible and technically equivalent to virgin solutions. The film recipe has been developed by Total. It requires the use of Total Lumicene Supertough 22ST05 as "booster" for the recyclates in order to match the demanding market requirements.

The Clean Site Circular Project, coordinated by Valipac, brings together key actors along the value chain:

Morssinkhof Rymoplast, which produces high quality recyclates from collected shrink hoods;
Total Polymers, which has developed the film recipe and the "booster" for the recyclates;
Oerlemans Packaging, which produces shrink hood films;
Wienerberger, which uses the shrink hoods for their pallets of building materials;
Valipac, which implemented the Clean Site System 15 years ago for the collection of wrapping films on construction sites;
Fema, which represents the building material actors in Belgium.

Through Fema, the project members intend to spread over this success story to the construction market in Europe.

As MRC informed before, in December 2017, Total inaugurated the new units at its Antwerp integrated refining & petrochemicals platform, which had progressively started up in the previous few months.

Total S.A. is a French multinational oil and gas company and one of the six "Supermajor" oil companies in the world with business in Europe, the United States, the Middle East and Asia. The company's petrochemical products cover two main groups: base chemicals and the consumer polymers (polyethylene, polypropylene and polystyrene) that are derived from them.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Fluor Corporation announced that its joint venture with TechnipFMC has successfully completed its engineering, procurement and construction management services scope of work on Sasol’s world-scale petrochemical complex in Westlake, Louisiana.

The joint venture will continue to provide assistance to the Sasol team with remaining activities by working with Sasol in parallel on transition plans for each unit and system. The joint venture team will also assist in performance testing for the complex.

A 1.5-million-ton-per-year ethane cracker is at the heart of the complex, which also includes six downstream chemical units and associated utilities, infrastructure and offsites.

"This milestone is the culmination of nearly seven years of hard work by Fluor’s project team and we are proud to have successfully delivered our scope," said Mark Fields, president of Fluor’s Energy & Chemicals business in the Americas. "We brought our extensive U.S. Gulf Coast construction and megaproject expertise using our integrated solutions approach, and we are proud of the lasting positive impact this project will have on Southwest Louisiana."

Beginning in November 2018, Fluor’s joint venture began incremental transitions of assets from the joint venture to Sasol upon mechanical completion of each unit or system. All units have been transitioned to Sasol except for the low-density polyethylene unit, which will be handed over by the end of March 2019.

The project achieved first steam in August 2018. Utilities to support the early process units were fully operational by the end of November 2018 and the linear low-density polyethylene unit achieved beneficial operations in February 2019.

More than 6,000 staff and craft were on site at peak to build the complex, which use the ethylene produced by the cracker to manufacture high-value chemicals that are used in everyday consumer products. The project team strengthened and widened more than two miles of roadway in the community to support the completion of more than 500 heavy haul transports to the project site.

The Fluor joint venture integrated a team of 30 main construction contractors and worked in collaboration with Sasol to strengthen the local economy, with more than $4 billion committed to Louisiana businesses. AMECO, Fluor’s equipment division, provided construction equipment to various subcontractors onsite.

The joint venture also invested in the local community by contributing more than USD185,000 to local schools and charitable organizations throughout the project.

Founded in 1912, Fluor Corporation (NYSE: FLR) is a global engineering, procurement, fabrication, construction and maintenance company that transforms the world by building prosperity and empowering progress.

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