ExxonMobil to start up its linear alpha olefins unit in Baytown in mid-2023

ExxonMobil announced that construction of the new linear alpha olefins (LAO) manufacturing unit at its Baytown, Texas, integrated petrochemical complex is progressing and targeting commercial start up in mid-2023, according to Hydrocarbonprocessing.

When fully operational, the new facility will have the capacity to produce approximately 350,000 metric tons of LAO annually.

ExxonMobil will manufacture 10 high-purity LAO products at the site and market the new offering under the ELEVEXX brand name. Extremely diverse, LAO molecules are used in a broad range of applications, including in plastic packaging, high-performing engine and industrial oils, and as building blocks for surfactants and other specialty chemicals.

The new manufacturing facility will feature the latest quality control technology, including in-line analyzers engineered to assess product quality and purity in real time, helping to maximize finished LAO molecule consistency and supply reliability.

As MRC wrote before, KBR and ExxonMobil Catalysts and Licensing will collaborate to bring significant advancements to propane dehydrogenation (PDH) technology. Under the collaboration, ExxonMobil's new proprietary catalyst technology will be combined with KBR's proprietary K-PRO PDH technology to convert propane into propylene. Enabled by the superior performance of ExxonMobil's new catalyst, the combined technology solution could offer financial savings compared to PDH technologies currently available.

We remind that in February, 2022, ExxonMobil and SABIC successful started up Gulf Coast Growth Ventures world-scale manufacturing facility in San Patricio County, Texas. The new facility will produce materials used in packaging, agricultural film, construction materials, clothing, and automotive coolants. The operation includes a 1.8 MM metric tpy ethane steam cracker, two polyethylene (PE) units capable of producing up to 1.3 MM metric tpy, and a monoethylene glycol (MEG) unit with a capacity of 1.1 MM metric tpy.

Ethylene and propylene are the main feedstocks for the production of polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP), respectively.

According to MRC''s ScanPlast report, Russia's estimated PE consumption totalled 2,487,450 tonnes in 2021, up by 13% year on year. Shipments of all grades of ethylene polymers increased. At the same time, PP shipments to the Russian market totalled 1,494.280 tonnes, up by 21% year on year. Deliveries of homopolymer PP and PP block copolymers increased, whreas.shipments of PP random copolymers decreased significantly.

ExxonMobil is the largest non-government owned company in the energy industry and produces about 3% of the world's oil and about 2% of the world's energy.
MRC

Amidst the ongoing conflict between Russia and Ukraine in Eastern Europe, key industry players are releasing announcements regarding their stand on this topic. From taking firm actions such as retracting services to provide humanitarian resources, there is a lot happening around the globe, according to SpecialChem.

In this curated piece, get a clear understanding on plastic additives industry’s take and the measures they are adopting that will alter the market trends and developments moving forward.

Clariant announced that it will suspend business with Russia in response to the Russian state’s intolerable acts of violence in Ukraine with immediate effect. Clariant’s operations in Russia include a sales office and a laboratory in Moscow and contribute approximately 2% to the company’s annual sales.

Honeywell has substantially suspended sales, distribution and service activities in Russia and Belarus. The company prioritizes the safety and security of the employees and partners in the region and responding to their immediate needs.

Solvay has decided to suspend its operations and new investments in Russia. Further, Solvay will suspend dividend payments from Rusvinyl, an independent 50:50 joint venture in Russia.

Effective immediately, LyondellBasell will not enter into any new business transactions or relationships with Russian state-owned entities. LyondellBasell also intend to discontinue business relationships with Russian state-owned entities to the extent legally possible. The company is in the process of assessing how this will affect the operations, including feedstocks, utilities, supply chain providers, and customers. Additionally, they are complying with all US and international sanctions which have been put into place because of this crisis.

ExxonMobil discontinues operations and developing steps to exit the Sakhalin-1 venture. The company’s operations in Sakhalin-1 project was on behalf of an international consortium of Japanese, Indian and Russian companies. The process to discontinue operations will be carefully managed and closely coordinated with the co-venturers to ensure it is executed safely.

As MRC wrote earlier, in July, 2021, Neste and LyondellBasell announced a long-term commercial agreement under which LyondellBasell will source Neste RE, a feedstock from Neste that has been produced from 100% renewable feedstock from bio-based sources, such as waste and residue oils and fats. This feedstock will be processed through the cracker at LyondellBasell’s Wesseling, Germany, plant into polymers and sold under the CirculenRenew brand name.

Ethylene and propylene are the main feedstocks for the production of polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP), respectively.

According to MRC''s ScanPlast report, Russia's estimated PE consumption totalled 2,487,450 tonnes in 2021, up by 13% year on year. Shipments of all grades of ethylene polymers increased. At the same time, PP shipments to the Russian market totalled 1,494.280 tonnes, up by 21% year on year. Deliveries of homopolymer PP and PP block copolymers increased, whreas.shipments of PP random copolymers decreased significantly.
MRC

Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC), Intercontinental Exchange (ICE) and partners in ICE Futures Abu Dhabi (IFAD) have officially celebrated the first anniversary of trading of the Murban Futures Contract on the IFAD commodities exchange, said the company.

IFAD began operations on 29 March 2021 and during its first year, the equivalent of around 1.5 billion barrels of Abu Dhabi’s flagship lower-carbon Murban crude oil was traded on the exchange. IFAD has attracted over 90 market participants and Murban is now more widely available to both physical purchasers of crude oil and financial market participants around the world, reinforcing the United Arab Emirate’s (UAE) role as a reliable global energy supplier.

The introduction of the Murban Futures Contract was backed by ICE, ADNOC and nine of the world’s largest energy companies who joined IFAD as founding partners; BP, GS Caltex, INPEX, ENEOS, PetroChina, PTT, Shell, TotalEnergies and Vitol.

The IFAD exchange situated in ADGM capitilizes on the growing demand for Murban crude oil, particularly from markets in Asia where Murban is popular with many longstanding customers. It is located between Asian, European and United States (U.S.) trading time-zones, allowing Murban to be traded at least 22 hours of each trading day.

The continual growth of the trading ecosystem at Abu Dhabi Global Market (ADGM), including the establishment of ADNOC Global Trading, ADNOC Trading and the opening of trading offices for both India’s Reliance Industries and Thailand’s PTT, signals the growing importance of Abu Dhabi as a trading hub.

Following the launch of IFAD, Murban is freely traded, offering crude customers increased access, better price transparency, and flexibilty to hedge and manage risks. Traded alongside Brent and West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crudes, Murban is well-positioned to act as an important price marker for crude oil. ICE Murban Futures are physically delivered contracts, with one futures contract equating to 1,000 barrels of Murban crude oil delivered from the ADNOC Terminal located in Fujairah, on the East coast of the UAE.

Murban is a light, sweet crude grade that is unique to the UAE, with consistent and stable production volumes, large number of international buyers, and numerous long-term concession and production partners. ADNOC’s flagship crude has a carbon intensity less than half the industry average, positioning it in the market as a lower carbon crude oil when compared to other crude grades.

Discovered in 1958, Murban has played a pivotal role in enabling the UAE’s economic growth and development. Production capacity of Murban is over 2 million barrels per day and it accounts for around 50% of the UAE’s total production capacity. ADNOC plans to increase the production capacity of Murban to more than 2.5 million barrels per day by 2030 as it expands its crude oil production capacity to 5 million barrels of crude per day.

As per MRC, The Abu Dhabi National Oil Company has activated business continuity plans to ensure continued supply of products to its local and international customers following an incident on its Mussafah fuel depot. The company in an earlier statement that the incident at the fuel depot occurred at around 10:000 hours (06:00 GMT) on 17 January. The incident resulted in the outbreak of a fire and three workers were killed as a result, it said.

As per MRC, the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC) has signed of a strategic partnership with Borealis AG that confirms a USD6.2 B (AED22 B) investment agreement between the companies to build the fourth Borouge facility - Borouge 4 - at the polyolefin manufacturing complex in Ruwais, United Arab Emirates (UAE), which will produce 1.4 MM tons of polyethylene (PE) per year.


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Baker Hughes is collaborating with C3 AI, Accenture and Microsoft on industrial asset management (IAM) solutions for clients in the energy and industrial sectors, according to Hydrocarbonprocessing.

The collaboration will focus on creating and deploying Baker Hughes' IAM solutions that use digital technologies to help improve the safety, efficiency, and emissions profile of industrial machines, field equipment, and other physical assets. Applying their individual strengths, the four companies will collaborate on Baker Hughes IAM capabilities that help optimize plant equipment, operational processes and business operations through improved uptime, increased operational flexibility, capital planning and energy efficiency management.

The solutions will be designed for industries including oil and gas, renewable energy, thermal power generation, metals and mining, chemicals and pulp and paper.

The companies will also explore collaborating on solutions that help achieve net-zero carbon emissions and decarbonize energy and industrial sectors, including emissions management.

Baker Hughes will provide domain-specific digital expertise and technology for industrial customers, including leading condition-monitoring software for mission critical machinery, industrial asset strategy advisors, proven machine and equipment edge sensor and related controls capabilities.

C3 AI will provide a flexible artificial intelligence (AI) application development platform that complements Baker Hughes technologies as well as experience developing and deploying applications at scale for a wide range of equipment used across industries.

Accenture will help drive product innovation, design and development and provide strategic support and systems integration at scale, drawing on its experience to transform asset management across industries to help improve profitability and reduce risk.

Microsoft will provide secure cloud infrastructure for big data, advanced Microsoft Azure services including AI, IoT, high performance computing as well as modern work and business applications.

As MRC reported earlier, in November 2021, Shell Global Solutions BV and energy technology company Baker Hughes signed a broad strategic collaboration agreement to accelerate the global energy transition by helping each other achieve their respective commitments for net-zero carbon emissions and advancing solutions to decarbonize energy and industrial sectors.

We remind that Royal Dutch Shell plans to reduce its refining and chemicals portfolio by more than half, it said in July 2020 without giving a precise timeframe. The move is part of the Anglo-Dutch company's plan to shrink its oil and gas business and expand its renewables and power division to reduce greenhouse gas emissions sharply by 2050.

Ethylene and propylene are the main feedstocks for the production of polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP), respectively.

According to MRC''s ScanPlast report, Russia's estimated PE consumption totalled 2,487,450 tonnes in 2021, up by 13% year on year. Shipments of all grades of ethylene polymers increased. At the same time, PP shipments to the Russian market totalled 1,494.280 tonnes, up by 21% year on year. Deliveries of homopolymer PP and PP block copolymers increased, whreas.shipments of PP random copolymers decreased significantly.
MRC

Evonik has invested a double-digit million-euro sum to increase production capacity for isobutene derivates by more than 50% at its site in Marl, Germany, said the the specialty producer.

The isobutene part of the C4 production network produces specialty chemicals tertiary butanol (TBA), di-isobutene (DiB) and 3,5,5-trimethylhexanal (TMH). The recently completed expansion improves security of supply, flexibility, and quality of products for customers, with applications as intermediate materials for the pharmaceutical and chemical industries.

Works began in June 2020 to expand C4 production to eliminate existing bottlenecks in production and logistics. The conversion work has increased the purity of TMH produced in Marl from around 88% to more than 95%.

Evonik produces two grades of TBA – pure or as an azeotropic mixture – for use in production of organic peroxides for the plastics industry and special solvents and tablet coatings for the pharmaceutical industry.

DiB is a highly branched C8 molecule used as an intermediate to produce UV stabilisers, high performance lubricants and special polymer resins.

TMH is an aldehyde with high isometric purity, used as an intermediate to produce high-performance lubricants (particularly cooling lubricants), lubricant additives, and as specialty products for the cosmetics and fragrance industries.

As MRC reported before, Evonik is investing a three-digit million-euro sum in the construction of a new production plant for bio-based and fully biodegradable rhamnolipids. The decision to build the plant follows a breakthrough in Evonik's research and development. Rhamnolipids are biosurfactants and serve as active ingredients in shower gels and detergents. Demand for environ-mentally friendly surfactants is growing rapidly worldwide.

We remind that in February, 2020, Dow and Evonik entered into an exclusive technology partnership. Together, they plan to bring a unique method for directly synthesizing propylene glycol (PG) from propylene and hydrogen peroxide to market maturity.

Propylene is the main feedstock for the production of polypropylene (PP).

According to MRC's ScanPlast report, PP shipments to the Russian market were 1,363,850 tonnes in January-November, 2021, up by 25% year on year. Supply of homopolymer PP and block-copolymers of propylene (PP block copolymers) increased, whereas supply of injection moulding PP random copolymers decreased significantly.

Evonik is one of the world leaders in specialty chemicals. The company is active in more than 100 countries around the world and generated sales of EUR12.2 billion and an operating profit (adjusted EBITDA) of EUR1.91 billion in 2020. Evonik goes far beyond chemistry to create innovative, profitable and sustainable solutions for customers. About 33,000 employees work together for a common purpose: to improve life today and tomorrow.

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