Tag: Gasification

As refiners adapt to the transition to a lower carbon economy, different strategies are likely to impact upon sulphur output.

As environmental SO2 emission regulations become more stringent, tail gas treating options become limited. To potentially achieve lower opex and improved plot plan, utilising a biological desulphurisation process as an alternative to a conventional amine-based TGT unit is becoming of increased interest in the oil and gas industry. At the same time, demands for increased SRU capacity and reliability favour the use of medium and high-level oxygen enrichment.

Qatar construction services company UCC Holding has signed a memorandum of understanding with the Kazakh Ministry of Energy for a gas treatment plant at the Kashagan field with a capacity of 6 billion cubic meters as part of the Phase 2B expansion. The memorandum was signed by Minister of Energy Almassadam Satkaliyev and Mohamed Moutaz Al Khayyat, chairman of UCC Holding.

The closure of CF Industries’ ammonia plant at Billingham, Teesside (see Industry News, page 8) marks the end of a long era for UK fertilizer manufacture. The facility was the last operating ammonia plant in the country, following CF’s decision to permanently close its site at Ince in Cheshire in June last year. Going forward, Billingham will now rely on imported ammonia as a feedstock to run the nitric acid and 625,000 t/a ammonium nitrate plants on the site.

Gasification, particularly of waste and biomass, is seeing interest as sustainable sources of syngas. But there are both technical and commercial challenges to wider adoption.

Continuing growth in energy uses indicate robust demand for methanol over the coming years, but the current slate of new projects does not look sufficient to meet it. Is methanol approaching a supply crunch?

Fertilizer plant owners are installing highly efficient and reliable scrubbing equipment to satisfy increasingly strict emissions regulations globally. We highlight recent advances in scrubbing performance and technology.

Advanced Methanol Amsterdam (AMA) is a production facility, that will be realised in the Port of Amsterdam's Biopark, which is destined to produce advanced methanol that meets the European renewable energy directive (RED) requirements. Once completed, AMA will be the flagship production site for GIDynamics and GIDARA Energy and for its High Temperature Winkler (HTW ® ) gasification technology. AMA will also be the first of its kind green methanol unit designed by Casale.

A move towards so-called ‘sustainable aviation fuels’ (SAF) could see refineries having to recast their operations. What might this mean for sulphur production?

Fischer-Tropsch technology has long offered alternative production routes to synthetic fuels, but has struggled to make a use case outside of some niche applications. Could the greening of the chemical industry offer another way forward for the technology?