MOSCOW (MRC) -- Wanhua Chemical Group has disclosed plans for a second ethylene cracker project at its Yantai, China, site with local government officials, reported Chemweek.
The project will include a 1.2-million metric tons/year (MMt/y) ethylene unit; pyrolysis gasoline hydrogenation; aromatics extraction; and production facilities for butadiene, high-density polyethylene (HDPE), low-density (LDPE), PE plastomers and elastomers, polypropylene (PP), and other derivatives. Timing and other details were not disclosed. The second ethylene project will use naphtha and C4s as feedstock.
Wanhua's first ethylene project in Yantai is currently under construction. Wanhua said in its annual report published in July that construction on the phase-one project will be complete in 2020. The first project includes a 1 MMt/y ethylene unit as well as polyvinyl chloride and linear-low density PE. Wanhua is also building a propylene oxide/styrene monomer plant at Yantai.
As MRC wrote before, China’s top petrochemical maker Wanhua Chemical Group aims to increase LPG imports to about 5.5 million mt in 2020 from 4 million mt this year as it procures feedstock from diversified sources ahead of new projects in Yantai and widens trading activities in Asia.
A 1 million mt/year ethylene integration project - phase two of its petrochemical project in northeast Shandong province - will be the first ethylene cracker to use LPG as feedstock globally and is set for commercial production in the second half of 2020. Together with associated downstream units and a nearby feedstock storage rock cavern with a capacity of 1.2 million cubic meters, the project is costing around Yuan 20 billion.
Ethylene and propylene are feedstocks for producing polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP).
According to MRC's ScanPlast report, Russia's estimated PE consumption totalled 1,904,410 tonnes in the first eleven months of 2019, up by 6% year on year. Shipments of all PE grades increased. PE shipments increased from both domestic producers and foreign suppliers. The PP consumption in the Russian market was 1,161,830 tonnes in January-November 2019, up by 7% year on year. Deliveries of all grades of propylene polymers increased, with the homopolymer PP segment accounting for the largest increase.
MRC