Borealis AG, Vienna, has let a contract to Jacobs Engineering Group Inc., Dallas, to complete a feasibility study for the proposed expansion of Borealis’ polypropylene (PP) plants in Belgium.
The feasibility study will assess a series of capacity increases through projects designed to debottleneck Borealis’ existing Belgian PP units to help further strengthen the company’s position as a leading PP provider in Europe, said Alfred Stern, executive vice-president of Borealis Polyolefins.
The potential PP capacity increase would take full advantage of additional propylene supply from a proposed 740,000-tonne/year propane dehydrogenation (PDH) unit at Borealis subsidiary Borealis Kallo NV’s production site in Kallo, Belgium, Jacobs said.
Neither Jacobs nor Borealis disclosed a value or duration of the feasibility study contract, which was awarded under terms of an existing framework agreement between the parties.
Details regarding which Belgian PP units would be debottlenecked or the volume of additional capacity that would come online as a result of the proposed projects have yet to be revealed.
Kallo PDH plant
This latest contract follows Borealis’ earlier contract award to Jacobs to provide a front-end engineering design study for the Kallo PDH plant (OGJ Online, Jan. 4, 2018).
Jacobs, which completed a feasibility study for the proposed plant in June 2017, previously said it expected to complete its scope of work on the FEED phase of the project by mid-2018.
Borealis also let a contract to Honeywell UOP LLC to provide licensing of its proprietary C3 Oleflex technology, basic engineering design, as well as services, equipment, catalysts, and adsorbents for the proposed Kallo PDH plant (OGJ Online, Feb. 2, 2017).
With a final investment decision on the PDH project due by yearend, the new plant—if approved—is scheduled for startup by yearend 2021, according to Borealis.
Contact Robert Brelsford at [email protected].
