PJSC Lukoil is starting construction on its previously announced project to add a grassroots petrochemical unit at subsidiary LLC Lukoil Nizhegorodnefteorgsintez’s (NNOS) 17-million tonnes/year (tpy) Kstovo refinery in central Russia’s Nizhny Novgorod region (OGJ Online, Sept. 10, 2020).
In a July 21 ceremony, NNOS laid the foundation stone for construction of the planned polypropylene complex that, once in operation, will process a feedstock of propylene supplied by the refinery’s two existing catalytic crackers to produce 500,000-tpy of product for other plastic manufacturers in the region, Lukoil said.
The polypropylene project comes as part of a plan to monetize anticipated increases in production from Nizhny Novgorod’s two 2-million tpy catalytic crackers, both of which are currently undergoing modernization works, according to the operator.
Lukoil said it also is undertaking a project to install a similar polypropylene unit at subsidiary’s Lukoil Neftochim Burgas AD’s 7-million tpy refinery along the Black Sea coast in Bulgaria.
The operator, however, has yet to disclose further details regarding targeted commissioning timelines of either the Nizhny Novgorod or Burgas petrochemical projects.
Unit startup
The July 21 groundbreaking ceremony took place alongside a separate event celebrating NNOS’s commissioning of a 150,000-tpy polymer-bitumen binders production unit at the refinery, which will supply specialty bitumen products to help extend lifetime of roadway pavement, Lukoil said.
The new bitumen unit follows NNOS’s startup of the refinery’s new bitumen terminal in 2020, which is equipped to accommodate loading of 200 bitumen trucks daily as part of Lukoil’s broader program to further expand its bitumen business.
NNOS’s polypropylene and bitumen projects follow the operator’s recent mechanical completion of its long-planned deep conversion, delayed coking complex, which will enable the Nizhny Novgorod refinery to slash its production of fuel oil by 2.6 million tpy and increase annual output of Russian Class 5 (equivalent to Euro 5)-quality diesel fuel by 700,000 tpy (OGJ Online, June 18, 2021).
Scheduled for full commissioning during fourth-quarter 2021, the new delayed coking complex will include the following major units:
- A 2.11-million tpy delayed coker.
- A 1.5-million tpy combined diesel fuel and gasoline hydrotreater.
- A 50,000-cu m/hr hydrogen production unit.
- A 425,000-tpy gas fractionator.
- An 81,000-tpy combined elemental sulfur-sulfuric acid production unit.
