Chinese Petroleum Corp. (CPC), Taipei, is operating near capacity at a new worldscale naphtha cracking plant at Taiwan's 425,000 b/cd Kaohsiung refinery.
Kaohsiung'$400,000 metric ton/year No. 5 naphtha plant began producing specification ethylene within 17 hr of receiving first feed and achieved desired purity of all major products by Feb. 16, At last report, CPC was slowly increasing plant throughput.
State owned CPC is Taiwan's leading ethylene producer. The company also oversees a wide range of other upstream and downstream oil and gas activities in Taiwan, including:
- Onshore and offshore drilling.
- Refining and manufacturing of petroleum products and petrochemical raw materials.
- Storage, transportation, and sales of gas and petroleum products.
- Liquefied natural gas importing and research and development.
Start up of the Kaohsiung naphtha cracker brings to more than 70 the number of operating units around the world using proprietary furnace technology developed by M.W. Kellogg Co.' Houston. Nearly 30 more plants are in various stages of design and engineering.
