Ineos Olefins & Polymers UK, a subsidiary of Ineos AG, Rolle, Switzerland, has let a contract to Linde AG subsidiary Selas-Linde GMBH, Pullach, Germany, to build a tenth furnace that will improve efficiency and increase production capacity of the existing Kinneil Gas cracker at the ethylene plant of its 10 million-tonne/year integrated refining and petrochemical complex in Grangemouth, Scotland.
The £60-million Grangemouth expansion will ensure the business can continue meeting growing demand for its products from the site, which in 2016, began receiving plentiful supplies of competitive US shale gas ethane under a long-term agreement, Ineos said.
Subject to planning approval, preparatory project work will begin later this year, with main construction work scheduled to start in 2019 for a targeted commissioning by yearend 2020, the operator said.
Confirmation of the unspecified contract—for which a value was not disclosed—follows a June 2017 announcement by Ineos that it was planning a series of proposed grassroots and brownfield projects to expand its ethylene and propylene production capacities in Europe to support continued growth of the company’s European petrochemical business (OGJ Online, June 12, 2017).
Alongside the addition of a propane dehydrogenation plant designed to produce 750,000 tpy of propylene for Ineos units across Europe, the proposed projects were to include expansions of ethylene production capacities by 900,000 tpy total at the company’s existing crackers at Grangemouth and Rafnes, Norway, to raise capacities of the crackers to more than 1 million tpy each.
Contact Robert Brelsford at [email protected].
