MOSCOW (MRC) -- Zhejiang Petroleum & Chemical Co Ltd, one of two new major refineries built in China in 2019, has recently started up the remaining units in the first phase of its refinery and petrochemical complex, reported Reuters.
The complex, in east China’s Zhoushan city, is now producing oil products and chemicals to commercial specifications, Zhejiang Petrochemical said on its website.
The company, 51% owned by private chemical group Zhejiang Rongsheng Holdings, said it has started test production at ethylene, aromatics and other downstream facilities, without giving further details.
Zhejiang Petrochemical started a first 200,000 barrels per day (bpd) crude processing unit in late May, following on from the start of a 400,000-bpd refinery owned by another private chemical major Hengli Petrochemical.
The newly started units at Zhejiang Petrochemical should include a second 200,000-bpd crude unit, a 1.2 million tonnes per year (tpy) ethylene unit and a 2 million tpy paraxylene unit, according to several industry sources with knowledge of the plant’s operations.
As MRC wrote previously, in early December 2012, Zhejiang Petroleum & Chemical Co Ltd launched a 3.8-million-ton-per-year reformer unit, a key processing facility at its new mega refinery and petrochemical complex in east China. The reformer unit, which processes naphtha into aromatics, is the world’s single-largest facility of its kind.
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