Contracts let for Russian ethylene project

Nov. 18, 2019
Baltic Chemical Co. and China National Chemical Engineering No. 7 Construction Co. Ltd. have let contracts to McDermott to provide technology licensing and engineering for Baltic Chemical Complex's ethane cracking project on the Gulf of Finland.

Baltic Chemical Co. (BCC) and China National Chemical Engineering No. 7 Construction Co. Ltd. (CC7) have let contracts to McDermott International Inc. to provide technology licensing and engineering for RusGazDobycha subsidiary Baltic Chemical Complex LLC’s ethane cracking project on the Gulf of Finland near Ust-Luga, Russia (OGJ Online, Apr. 2, 2019).

McDermott's Lummus Technology will provide both the process design package (PDP) engineering and the technology license for its olefin production and recovery technology, including Lummus Technology's proprietary ethylene steam cracking process, for production of polymer-grade ethylene at the complex, the service provider said.

Slated to become the largest ethylene integration project in the world, the natural gas processing chemical plant will include two ethylene cracking sites, each with a capacity of 1.4 million tonnes/year, according to McDermott.

Work on the project is scheduled to begin immediately, with both the BCC and CC7 contracts—each valued at between $1-50 million—to be reflected in McDermott’s fourth-quarter 2019 backlog.

According to local news reports from China and Russia, China National Chemical Engineering Group will serve as general contractor for the more than $13-billion project, which will take 60 months to build from the start of construction.

Alongside the ethylene crackers, the project also will include six polyethylene trains with a combined processing capacity of 480,000 tpy, as well as two linear alpha olefin plants with a combined capacity of 137,000 tpy.