Construction wraps on IL alkylation units at Sinopec refineries

Construction is now completed on two revamps of brownfield units based on composite ionic liquid (IL) alkylation technology at China Petroleum & Chemical Corp. (Sinopec) subsidiaries Sinopec Anqing Co.’s 161,000-b/d refinery in Anqing, Anhui Province, and Wuhan Petrochemical Co. Ltd.’s 161,000-b/d refinery in Wuhan City, Hubei Province (OGJ, Jan. 7, 2019, p. 61).

Each unit is designed to produce 300,000 tonnes/year of high-quality alkylate with research octane numbers ranging from 96-98, said Well Resources Inc., licensor for Beijing-based China University of Petroleum’s (CUP) Ionikylation process.

Commissioning of the Anqing refinery’s Ionikylation unit is scheduled for mid-July, while the Wuhan unit will be commissioned by the end of third-quarter 2019.

The completed unit revamps follow the overhaul and commissioning of a brownfield alkylation unit with Ionikylation technology at Sinopec Jiujiang Co.’s 161,000-b/d refinery in Jiujiang City, Jiangxi Province, China, earlier this year (OGJ Online, Apr. 2, 2019).

​Refiners in Asia-Pacific are increasingly turning to Ionikylation alkylation technology—which uses a proprietary composite IL catalyst that eliminates reliance on more dangerous, corrosive, and hazardous chemicals such as hydrogen fluoride and sulfuric acid—as they seek to meet increasingly more stringent clean-fuel standards.