Shangdong Yulong lets contract for integrated refining complex

Feb. 8, 2021
Shandong Yulong Petrochemical has let a contract to UOP to provide a suite of technologies for new units at the aromatics complex of its integrated refining and petrochemical complex under construction in Yantai City, Shandong Province, China.

Shandong Yulong Petrochemical Co. Ltd.—a joint venture of China’s Nanshan Holdings Co. Ltd. (71%), Wanhua Chemical Group Co. Ltd. (20%), and Shandong Development & Investment Holding Group Co. Ltd. (9%)—has let a contract to Honeywell International Inc. subsidiary UOP LLC to provide a suite of technologies for new units at the aromatics complex of Shandong Yulong’s grassroots 20-million tonnes/year integrated refining and petrochemical complex under construction as part of the first phase of the Yulong Island Refining and Chemical Integrating Project at Yulong Petrochemical Industrial Park, Yantai City, Shandong Province, China.

Alongside technology licensing for a range of its proprietary advanced platforming and aromatics technologies, UOP’s scope of delivery under the contract also includes engineering design, key equipment, catalysts, and adsorbents, as well as operator training and technical services for startup and continuing operations, the service provider said on Feb. 8.

Specific technologies and units UOP will provide under the contract include:

  • A UOP Unionfining naphtha hydrotreating unit and UOP CCR Platforming technology to convert naphtha into high-octane gasoline and aromatics for production of multiple synthetic materials.
  • UOP Olefin Removal Process (ORP) and UOP Sulfolane technology for aromatics extraction.
  • UOP Isomar isomerization technology.
  • UOP Tatoray technology for toluene disproportionation.

Once completed, Shandong Yulong’s complex aims to produce 3 million tpy of mixed aromatics, according to UOP.

The service provider disclosed neither a value of the contract nor a timeframe for its work on the project.

Complex overview

This latest contract for the nearly 127.4-billion yuan Yulong Island Refining and Chemical Integrating Project (Phase 1) follows Shandong Yulong’s previous award to Lummus Technology LLC to deliver technology licensing to be implemented at the complex’s two mixed-feed crackers, an ethylbenzene-styrene monomer (EB-SM) plant, and two polypropylene (PP) plants as follows:

  • The mixed-feed crackers of the complex’s two ethylene plants—each with a capacity of 1.5 million tpy—will use Lummus’s highly selective Short Residence Time (SRT) VII cracking heaters.
  • The 500,000-tpy EB-SM plant will be equipped with Lummus-UOP’s EBOne and CLASSIC SM technologies.
  • The two 400,000-tpy PP lines will use Lummus Novolen Technology GMBH’s proprietary Novolen gas-phase PP technology (OGJ Online, Nov. 17, 2020).

Official project documents from China’s Ministry of Ecology and Environment (MEE) revealed the Yulong Island complex—which, after gaining formal approval last year, began construction in late-October 2020—will include the following major units and available planned capacities:

  • One 10-million tpy atmospheric distillation unit.
  • One 10-million tpy combined atmospheric-vacuum distillation unit.
  • Two light hydrocarbon recovery units.
  • One 2.6-million tpy slurry bed residue hydrogenation unit.
  • One 1.2-million tpy solvent deasphalting unit.
  • One 100,000-cu m/hr residual oil hydrogen production unit.
  • Three 2.6-million tpy residual oil hydrotreating units.
  • One 1.5-million tpy wax oil hydrotreating unit.
  • One 2-million tpy wax oil hydrocracking unit.
  • One 500,000-tpy heavy oil, high-pressure hydrogenation unit.
  • One 3.4-million tpy diesel hydrotreating unit.
  • One 3.6-million tpy diesel hydrocracking unit.
  • One 1.4-million tpy kerosene hydrogenation unit.
  • One grassroots hydrogen centralized supply station.
  • One 4-million tpy catalytic cracking unit.
  • One 1.6-million tpy gas fractionation unit.
  • One 1-million tpy pyrolysis gasoline hydrogenation unit.
  • One 800,000-tpy aromatic extraction unit.
  • One 3-million tpy catalytic cracking unit.
  • One 700,000-tpy gas fractionation unit.
  • One 1.5-million tpy catalytic gasoline adsorption desulfurization (S-Zorb) unit.
  • Two 2.6-million tpy continuous reforming units.
  • One 3-million tpy aromatics combined plant.
  • One 220,000-cu m/hr coal hydrogen production unit.
  • Four 150,000-tpy sulfur recovery and tail gas treatment units.
  • One sour water stripping unit.
  • One solvent regeneration unit.
  • Two 1.5-million tpy ethylene plants.
  • Two 85-million tpy pyrolysis gasoline hydrogenation units.
  • Two 550,000-tpy aromatics extraction units.
  • Two 220,000-tpy butadiene extraction units.
  • One 500,000-tpy EB-SM plant.
  • Two 800,000-tpy ethylene glycol plants.
  • Two 400,000-tpy PP plants (Lummus Novolen-licensed).
  • Two 400,000-tpy PP plant (separate from Novolen-licensed units).
  • One 300,000-tpy PP plant (Japan Polypropylene Corp.-licensed HORIZONE process)
  • One 200,000-tpy low-density polyethylene-ethylene vinyl acetate LDPE-EVA unit.
  • One 400,000-tpy LDPE-EVA unit.
  • One 300,000-tpy high-density polyethylene (HDPE) unit.

Phase 1 of the development is scheduled to begin operation in 2022-23.