South Korean chemical producer LG Chem and Italian energy group Eni Sustainable Mobility have begun preliminary talks to jointly develop and operate a new biorefinery that would produce chemical products from renewable feedstocks.
The refinery would be located at LG Chem’s Daesan chemical complex, about 50 miles southwest of Seoul. The partnership, which the companies announced on Sept. 14, is in the technical and economic feasibility phase.
They expect to make a final investment decision by 2024, with plans to complete construction on the new refinery by 2026.
The biorefinery would have the capacity to process about 400,000 tons of bio-feedstocks annually for use in various products, including aviation fuel, hydrotreated vegetable oil and bio-naphtha.
The plant would use Eni’s Ecofining technology that it developed in collaboration with Honeywell UOP that transforms raw materials of biological origin into biofuel. The refinery would use LG Chem’s integrated value chain and existing utilities and facilities at the Daesan complex.
Under the proposed agreement, Eni would provide sustainable feedstocks primarily from cooking oil waste or vegetable oils from drought-resistant crops in degraded, semi-arid or abandoned soils not in competition with the food chain, LG Chem said.