Topsoe makes FID on big electrolyser project in Denmark

Topsoe has made a final investment decision (FID) to build what will be “the world’s largest” solid oxide electrolyzer cells (SOEC) electrolyzer plant, said the company.

The plant at Herning in Denmark’s Jutland region will have an initial capacity of 500 MW per year, with an option to expand to 5 GW.

With the Danish kroner (DKK) 2bn (USD267m) project, Topsoe would take power-to-x technology and electrolysis to produce green fuels to a “commercially competitive position, ultimately making the case for decarbonisation unarguable,” Topsoe said.

“We already have 500 MW of pre-sold capacity and are in discussions with other potential offtake partners as well, who find our electrolyzer technology attractive, and look forward to being able to make more announcements in due course,” said Sundus Cordelia Ramli, chief commercial officer (CCO) of Topsoe’s Power-to-X division.

Construction will start during H2 2022. Timelines for completion and startup were not disclosed.

As per MRC, Topsoe’s technologies are set to reduce its customers’ greenhouse gas emissions by 12 MMt in 2022 alone. These reductions will not be one-offs but ongoing for the years to come. The key driver is Topsoe’s renewable fuels solutions, producing low-carbon fuels from waste and biomass.
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Imperial Oil Ltd. says it and ExxonMobil Canada have closed the USD1.9-billion sale of their oil and gas-producing assets in the Montney and Duvernay areas to Whitecap Resources Inc., said Jwnenergy.

The two companies each owned 50 per cent of XTO Energy Canada, which held the assets, while Imperial itself is majority owned by ExxonMobil.

Imperial says the assets sold include almost 230,000 net hectares in the Montney shale and about 29,000 net hectares in the Duvernay shale, plus additional holdings in other areas of Alberta.

Whitecap says the acquisition will add the equivalent of about 32,000 barrels per day of production (including condensate and natural gas liquids) and over 2,000 drilling locations in the two fossil fuel plays.

Calgary-based Whitecap says the deal also includes a gas processing facility, and that integration of the acquired assets is already well underway.

Imperial said in January it would look to sell XTO Energy Canada as part of its strategy to focus on key oilsands assets.

As per MRC, Exxon Mobil (XOM.N) is in the process of transitioning its 30% stake in a Russian oil development "to another party," according to a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

Exxon Mobil announced in March its withdrawal from the Sakhalin-1 oil and gas project due to the situation around Ukraine. In the same month, the company announced the recall of its American employees employed in oil and gas projects in Russia.

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BASF, SABIC and Linde have started construction of the world’s first demonstration plant for large-scale electrically heated steam cracker furnaces, said the companies.

By using electricity from renewable sources instead of natural gas, the new technology has the potential to reduce CO2 emissions of one of the most energy-intensive production processes in the chemical industry by at least 90% compared to technologies commonly used today.

The demonstration plant will be fully integrated into one of the existing steam crackers at BASF’s Verbund site in Ludwigshafen, Germany. It will test two different heating concepts, processing around 4 tons of hydrocarbon per hour and consuming 6 megawatts of renewable energy. The start-up of the demonstration plant is targeted for 2023.

BASF and SABIC are investing together into the project and the demonstration plant will be operated by BASF. Linde is the engineering, procurement and construction partner for the project and in the future will commercialize the developed technologies.

To support the development of the novel furnace technology, the project has been granted €14.8 million by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action under its “Decarbonization in Industry” funding program. The program is supporting energy-intensive industries in Germany in their efforts to achieve carbon neutrality.

The demonstration plant aims to show that continuous olefin production is possible using electricity as a heat source. The plant is designed in a way that two heating concepts can be tested in parallel: Direct heating applies an electric current directly to the process tubes inside the reactor; indirect heating uses radiative heat of heating elements placed around the tubes. Testing these two concepts will make it possible to react flexibly to different customer and site requirements.

Steam crackers play a central role in the production of basic chemicals and require a significant amount of energy to break down hydrocarbons into olefins and aromatics. Typically, the reaction is conducted in furnaces at temperatures of about 850 degrees Celsius. Today these temperatures are reached by burning fossil fuels. The project aims to reduce the CO2 emissions by powering the process with electricity.

In March 24, 2021 BASF, SABIC and Linde have signed a joint agreement to develop and demonstrate solutions for electrically heated steam cracker furnaces. The partners have already jointly worked on concepts to use renewable electricity instead of the fossil fuel gas typically used for the heating process.

SABIC is a global diversified chemicals company, headquartered in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. It manufactures on a global scale in the Americas, Europe, Middle East and Asia Pacific, making distinctly different kinds of products: chemicals, commodity and high-performance plastics, agri-nutrients and metals.

Linde is a leading global industrial gases and engineering company with 2021 sales of $31 billion (€26 billion). We live our mission of making our world more productive every day by providing high-quality solutions, technologies and services which are making our customers more successful and helping to sustain and protect our planet. The company serves a variety of end markets including chemicals & energy, food & beverage, electronics, healthcare, manufacturing, metals and mining.

BASF operates through six core business segments: Chemicals, Materials, Industrial Solutions, Surface Technology, Nutrition & Care, and Agricultural Solutions. In Russia, the company has at least six subsidiaries: BASF LLC (fertilizer trade), BASF Industrial Metals LLC (metals trade in primary forms), BASF Yug LLC (seed trade), Hemetal LLC ( trade in industrial chemicals), LLC "MBS Building Systems" (trade in building materials and products) and LLC "BASF Vostok" (production of paints and varnishes).

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Engineering major Linde has signed a long-term agreement to supply high-purity industrial gases to PT Freeport Indonesia, a leading mining company in Indonesia, said Refiningandpetrochemicalsme.

Linde will build, own and operate an air separation unit to supply oxygen and nitrogen to PT Freeport Indonesia’s new copper smelter and refinery in Manyar, Indonesia, the engineering major said in a statement. The new copper smelter, the largest copper processing site in the world, will process concentrates from PT Freeport Indonesia’s Grasberg mine, the statement added.

The new on-site facility is expected to start up in mid-2024 and will be one of the largest air separation units in Indonesia. "Copper plays a key role in the electrification of transportation and industrial processes. We are excited to help PT Freeport expand its processing capacity in Indonesia,” said Moloy Banerjee, president, ASEAN & South Asia, Linde. He said, “By deploying Linde’s advanced technology, we will deliver a customized plant which will significantly improve energy efficiency."

Agreeing with this, Tony Wenas, president and director, PT Freeport Indonesia, said: “Linde’s track record for the safe and reliable supply of industrial gases made it our partner of choice as we expand our operations." Linde is a leading global industrial gases and engineering company and has reported $31 billion in revenue in 2021. The company serves a variety of end markets including chemicals & energy, food & beverage, electronics, healthcare, manufacturing, metals and mining.

The company claims that its industrial gases are used in countless applications, from life-saving oxygen for hospitals to high-purity & specialty gases for electronics manufacturing, hydrogen for clean fuels and much more.

As per MRC, Linde has completed their efforts as part of implementing the Amur Gas Chemical Complex (AGCC) construction project. "Linde has completed its work within the AGCC project framework. We are dealing with its adaptation to new conditions together with partners from Sinopec," the Russian chemical giant said. Early in 2020, Linde made the contract for provision of pyrolysis services for AGCC. The Amur Gas Chemical Complex is the joint venture of Sibur (60%) and China’s Sinopec (40%) for polyethylene and polypropylene production. The capacity of the plant will be up to 2.7 mln tonnes of polymers annually.
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Eurotecnica, the technology arm of the Proman family of companies has recently announced the award by Xinji Energy Chemical Co. of a contract for the implementation of the largest high pressure melamine plant in the world with a 120,000 ton per year capacity, said Process-worldwide.

Xinji Energy Chemical Co. has selected Eurotecnica’s ultimate 5th generation (G5) proprietary Euromel technology for the design and implementation of this landmark project.

Xinjiang Xuefeng, the group Xinji belongs to, is already the largest melamine producer in the world, and has chosen Eurotecnica’s Euromel because it features the lowest energy consumption on the market.

We remind, PetroChina Urumqi Petrochemical is planning to revamp and upgrade its refining facilities by adding some new refining as well as petrochemical units. A 450,000 tonne/year polypropylene (PP), a 300,000 tonne/year styrene monomer (SM), a 200,000 tonne/year polystyrene (PS), and a 1.2m tonne/year purified phthalate acid (PTA) unit will be installed as the petrochemical part. The refining part will mainly include a new 1.2m tonne/year solvent deasphalting (SDA), a 2.2m tonne/year fluid catalytic cracking (FCC), and a 1m tonne/year gas fractionation units.
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