MOSCOW (MRC) -- CVR Energy Inc plans to pursue a renewable diesel project at its 132,000 bpd Coffeyville, Kansas, refinery if it succeeds in producing the fuel at its Wynnewood, Oklahoma, plant, reported Reuters with reference to the refiner's statement.
CVR said it has excess hydrogen capacity and a high-pressure hydrotreater at Coffeyville that could be repurposed for renewable diesel production, pending approvals.
CVR is converting a hydrocracker at Wynnewood to allow for the production of renewable diesel, which could receive feedstock as early as May 2021, and begin processing by the following July, the company said.
Crude processing at the plant will decrease from 75,000 bpd to between 55,000 and 59,000 bpd.
“If market conditions change materially, then we would have the option to return the unit to hydrocarbon service fairly easily at minimum cost,” CVR Chief Executive David Lamp said on an earnings call with investors.
If refining margins remain weak, the refiner plans to install a pretreatment unit at Wynnewood to process lower carbon-intensity feedstocks like inedible corn oil, animal fats and used cooking oil.
As MRC informed previously, earlier this month, KBR, Inc. announced that a subsidiary of CVR Energy, Inc. ("CVR Energy") is proceeding with the next phase of the KBR Solid Acid Alkylation Technology (K-SAATTM) project for its refinery in Wynnewood, Oklahoma. CVR Energy previously awarded a contract to KBR to provide the basic engineering design based on K-SAAT technology to revamp its existing HF alkylation unit at its Wynnewood refinery. CVR Energy now plans to take the project to the next phase, which would entail KBR providing detailed engineering of the process equipment, proprietary equipment supply and module fabrication. The expected mechanical completion of the project would be late 2024, subject to regulatory and internal approvals.
We remind that in September 2020, Ningxia Baofeng Energy Group Co. (Baofeng Energy) selected KBR's proprietary cracker technology for its new methanol-to-olefins (MTO) project to be built in Ningxia, China. Under the contracts, KBR will provide process technology licensing and process design packages for Baofeng Energy's 500,000-t/y coal-to-olefins facility and its 500,000-t/y C2-C5 comprehensive utilization project. Once complete, the complex will be the "largest" single-train MTO plant in the world, KBR noted.
Ethylene and propylene are feedstocks for producing polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP).
According to MRC's ScanPlast report, Russia's estimated PE consumption totalled 2,220,640 tonnes in 2020, up by 2% year on year. Only shipments of low density polyethylene (LDPE) and high density polyethylene (HDPE) increased. At the same time, polypropylene (PP) shipments to the Russian market reached 1 240,000 tonnes in 2020 (calculated using the formula: production, minus exports, plus imports, excluding producers' inventories as of 1 January, 2020). Supply of exclusively PP random copolymer increased.
MRC