IRPC PLC has let a contract to Honeywell UOP LLC to provide a suite of advanced process technologies for IRPC’s maximum aromatics (MARS) project, a naphtha-reforming and aromatics complex to be built at the operator’s existing integrated petrochemical complex in Rayong Province, Thailand.
Honeywell UOP’s scope of work on the project—which is designed to convert IRPC’s available intermediate feedstocks to higher-value aromatics products such as paraxylene and benzene—includes delivery of technology licensing, design, and key equipment, as well as state-of-the-art catalysts and adsorbents, the service provider said.
Specific proprietary technologies and equipment Honeywell UOP will provide for the MARS project include:
• A CCR Platforming unit to convert naphtha into high-octane gasoline and aromatics.
• An LD Parex unit to recover high-purity paraxylene from mixed xylenes using a new, more energy efficient light desorbent.
• UOP Sulfolane technology to extract aromatics from the feed.
• UOP Isomar technology to convert xylene isomers into more valuable paraxylene.
• UOP Tatoray technology to convert toluene and C9 aromatics into mixed xylenes and high-purity benzene to more than double the yield of paraxylene from the naphtha feedstock.
Scheduled to be completed in 2022, the MARS naphtha-reforming and aromatics complex will produce 1.2 million tonnes/year of paraxylene and increase the site’s benzene production capacity to 495,000 tpy from its current 114,000-tpy capacity, Honeywell UOP said.
Honeywell UOP is slated to complete initial engineering design on the project by yearend, IRPC said.
Neither Honeywell UOP nor IRPC disclosed a value of the technology licensing and engineering contract.
Contact Robert Brelsford at [email protected].
