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India launches major refinery off-gas cracker complex
India’s Reliance Industries (RIL) has commissioned what it claims to be the world’s largest refinery off-gas cracker complex, at its integrated refinery-petrochemicals facility at Jamnagar, Gujarat, reports Raghavendra Verma in New Delhi. With a capacity of 1.5mn t/y the unit will make ethylene feedstock to produce mono-ethylene glycol (MEG) and polyethylene (PE).
According to a Reliance statement, the complex has been built with about 40% lower capital costs compared to similar projects globally and brings the combined ethylene capacity of the company close to 4mn t/y, counting all its five manufacturing sites in India.
Mukesh Ambani, Reliance Chairman and Managing Director, says the complex has been carefully designed to suit its feedstock integration and operate at high efficiency. The new unit, together with the MEG and PE manufacturing plants, ‘marks a paradigm shift in the profitability and sustainability of Reliance’s petrochemicals business’, he claims.
The cracker and MEG plant complete a comprehensive in-house polyester value chain, following Reliance’s commissioning of paraxylene, purified terephthalic acid, polyester filament and polyethylene terephthalate plants over last three years.
In another recent advance, Reliance has boosted its propylene production to enhance the output of its existing polypropylene plant at the Jamnagar complex, to produce high-value copolymers. Along with the company’s existing PE plants at other manufacturing sites, the new unit enhances its capability to produce the entire range of PE grades covering all end-uses in the Indian market.
The launch has been welcomed by the Indian plastics industry. Production capacity created by the new unit will increase both the quality and quantity of inputs, according to Akhilesh Bhargav, Chairman Environment for the All India Plastics Manufacturers Association in Mumbai. ‘Now the grades of the plastic raw material will also increase,’ he told Petroleum Review. ‘Previously we had to import or compromise on the grade of the material.’ According to Bhargav, the annual growth of India’s plastic processing industry has been more than 10% for several years and without the supply from this new unit such expansion would not be sustainable.
Reliance’s existing Jamnagar refinery complex, India
Photo: Reliance Industries
