MOSCOW (MRC) -- India’s national objective of achieving self-sufficiency in energy and reducing its fossil fuel footprint is being supported by Sulzer’s expertise in pump manufacturing and refinery processes, according to Hydrocarbonprocessing.
The country’s first bio-refinery, Assam Bio Refinery Pvt Ltd., built by Chempolis' technology, is a ground-breaking JV that will be the only refinery in the world to create bioethanol from bamboo - available in abundance in north-eastern India. To help realize this pioneering endeavor, Sulzer is delivering a range of engineered application pumps as well as core technology such as column internals for the refining process.
India, like most countries, is keen to improve the sustainability of its industrial sectors and is taking positive steps by using renewable feedstocks such as bamboo to create biofuels and other chemicals. To ensure a successful and reliable process, a joint venture has been formed between the state-run oil refining company, Numaligarh Refinery Ltd. and two Finnish companies, Fortum and Chempolis.
The facility will use Sulzer’s experience in pump design and manufacturing as well as separation technology to ensure long-term reliability and efficiency in the refining processes. The company’s expertise in the chemical industry is well-established and it has been supplying process pumps to similar applications all over the world for decades.
Once complete, the bio-refinery will use 300,000 tons of bamboo each year. In addition to the environmental benefits of the fuels and chemicals being produced, the refinery will procure bamboo and other raw materials from local suppliers, strengthening the community’s local economy.
Using Chempolis proprietary technology, the JV is demonstrating how India can utilize its own natural, sustainable resources to reduce the reliance on fossil fuels and work towards self-sufficiency in energy production. The bio-refinery is dimensioned to produce 60 MM liters of bioethanol, which can be used to help power vehicles, as well as 19,000 tons of furfural and 11,000 tons of acetic acid per year.
We remind that, as MRC wrote previously, GAIL (India) Ltd, India’s principal gas transmission and marketing company under the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas, is on track to start up its propane dehydrogenation (PDH) facility and polypropylene (PP) plant in Usar, Maharashtra by 2024. GAIL has recently chosen Lummus Technology’s CATOFIN process and Clariant’s tailor-made catalysts for India’s first PDH plant. Its upcoming 500 kiloton per annum PDH facility in Usar will be integrated with the downstream PP unit. The cost of PDH-PP project is estimated at USD1.2 B.
According to MRC's ScanPlast report, PP shipments to the Russian market were 1,226,530 tonnes in the first ten months of 2021, up by 26% year on year. Supply of propylene homopolymers (homopolymer PP) and block-copolymers of propylene (PP block copolymers) increased, whereas supply of injection moulding stat-copolymers of propylene (PP random copolymers) decreased significantly.
MRC