ExxonMobil Catalysts and Licensing LLC announces an agreement with Sinochem Hongrun Petrochemical Co. Limited, to license ExxonMobil’s Flexicoking technology to build a resid upgrading unit at Sinochem Hongrun’s High-End Chemical Park located in Binhai Economic-Technological Development Area, Weifang City, Shandong Province, People’s Republic of China.The grassroots unit will reportedly process about 1.2 million metric tons of vacuum residue feedstock per year and enable Sinochem Hongrun to produce high quality liquid products including clean transportation fuels and chemical feedstocks as well as clean-burning fuel gas. The project is currently in the engineering design phase and targeted for start-up in 2020.
“ExxonMobil’s Flexicoking technology offers greater flexibility than conventional delayed coking,” says Chris Birdsall, president of ExxonMobil Catalysts and Licensing LLC. “The application of Flexicoking technology will help the Sinochem Hongrun refinery optimize resid upgrading by minimizing capital investment and energy consumption.”
The process technology also reportedly provides environmental advantages by eliminating open air coke handling and coal transportation and reducing fired heater emissions due to the clean-burning fuel gas produced by the Flexicoking unit.
ExxonMobil’s Flexicoking technology is a continuous fluid-bed technology that thermally converts heavy oils – such as vacuum resid, oil sands bitumen, deasphalter bottoms and FCC bottoms – to lighter, more valuable products, according to the company. By integrating fluid coking with air-steam gasification, Flexicoking technology reportedly substantially eliminates petroleum coke production while providing a clean fuel gas.
For more information, visit: www.exxonmobil.com
