MOSCOW (MRC) -- Poland's top oil refiner PKN Orlen said it plans to invest 25 billion zlotys (USD6.6 billion) in green energy projects that will help it become climate neutral by 2050, said Hydrocarbonprocessing.
State-run PKN's plans, which follow low-emission strategies from Europe's energy giants, are out of line with the wider approach by Poland, which has been the only European Union state to refuse to commit to carbon neutrality by 2050. Top oil and gas firms in Europe have committed to greenhouse gas emission reduction targets which vary in scope and detail, making them hard for investors to compare.
BP, Shell, Total, Eni, and Equinor are all focusing cuts on oil and gas activities, while boosting investments in renewables and low carbon businesses, Reuters calculations show. "The global energy transformation that is taking place before our eyes is a huge development opportunity for Central Europe. As the largest company in the region, we want to increase our involvement in this process and we are well positioned to do it," PKN Chief Executive Daniel Obajtek said.
PKN said in a statement that it plans to reduce carbon emissions from its refinery and petrochemical assets by 20% and by 33% in its power generation over the next ten years, adding it will provide more details in its strategy update which is expected in the fourth quarter.
Earlier this year, PKN took over state-run utility Energa and replaced coal with gas as the proposed fuel for Energa's planned power plant in Ostroleka, northeast Poland. Energa is a minority shareholder in PGG, Poland's biggest coal producer which faces restructuring due to falling demand for coal and rising production costs. PKN Orlen did not refer to PGG in its statement.
As MRC informed earlier, in H1 September 2019, Honeywell announced that PKN ORLEN had licensed the UOP MaxEne process, which can increase production of ethylene and aromatics and improve the flexibility of gasoline production. The project, for the PKN Orlen facility in Plock, Poland, currently is in the basic engineering stage. Honeywell UOP, a leading provider of technologies for the oil and gas industry, first commercialized the UOP MaxEne process in 2013. The process enables refiners and petrochemical producers to direct molecules within the naphtha feed to the processes that deliver the greatest value and improve yields of fuels and petrochemicals.
Ethylene and propylene are feedstocks for producing polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP).
According to MRC's DataScope report, PE imports to Russia dropped in January-June 2020 by 7% year on year to 328,000 tonnes. High density polyethylene (HDPE) accounted for the main decrease in imports. At the same time, PP imports into Russia rose in the first six months of 2020 by 21% year on year to 105,300 tonnes. Propylene homopolymer (homopolymer PP) accounted for the main increase in imports.
PKN Orlen would be the first refining and petrochemicals company in Europe to use the Honeywell UOP MaxEne technology for molecule management of a naphtha stream to produce high-quality products including olefins, aromatics and gasoline.
MRC