Page 127 - CW E-Magazine (24-12-2024)

Point of View

With LAB supply constrained by competitive pressures,

time to examine investments in alternates

Nearly all Linear alkylbenzene (LAB) globally is converted
to its sulphonate (LABS), the major surfactant used in deter- 800
gents for more than 40 years. And for good reason. LABS is 700
versatile and has a history of safe usage verified by research 600
that has investigated virtually every part of the environment
exposed to it. 500
400
Technology trends in LAB…. 300
There are three basic steps in the production of LAB: normal
paraffins (NP) separation from straight run kerosene (a refinery 200
stream); mono-olefin production via catalytic dehydrogenation 100
of NP; and alkylation with benzene. 0
FY12 FY13 FY14 FY15 FY16 FY17 FY18 FY19 FY20 FY21 FY22 FY23 FY24
During the last four decades, several optimisations of the Net imports Production Demand
process as well as operating practices have been carried out, Source: Indian Oil Corporation

the most significant of which have been on the technology package. While in the 1970s, the predominant technology was based on alkylation
of benzene using chloro-paraffins and aluminium chloride (AlCl ), during the 1980s and 1990s the hydrofluoric acid (HF) process took the lead.
3
But HF technology is today almost abandoned for new LAB projects in favour of the fixed bed alkylation option – ‘Detal’, jointly developed
by UOP and Petresa. Its benefits – over the HF and AlCl processes – include lower investment costs, reduced maintenance expenditures,
3
simpler operation and outstanding final LAB quality.
…. And LABS production
LABS is made by sulphonation of LAB, and this is most efficiently done by thin-film sulphonation using sulphur trioxide, yielding a
surfactant with 96% LABS content. More common, however, in India is use of sulphuric acid, and this produces a LABS with lower active
content (90%). India is the world’s largest producer of 90% LABS, but in recent years capacity for the higher-grade product has been rising,
driven in some measure by customer demand and tightening conditions imposed on the disposal of the spent acid effluent generated when
sulphuric acid is used.

The spent acid finds some use in the manufacture of single super phosphate, a fertiliser, but a chunk of it is sold to traders and
indiscriminately disposed. New norms on how this spent acid – classified as hazardous waste – is handled aims to document usage, trans-
port, and eventual use, and could channel fresh investments in the cleaner thin-film technology.
Lagging LAB production ….
The first plant for LAB in India was set up in 1978 by Indian Petrochemicals Corporation Ltd. (IPCL) in Vadodara (the plant was shut
down in 2015). In 1984, Tamilnadu Petroproducts Ltd. (TPL) commissioned two lines for LAB, with cumulative capacity of 120-ktpa, which
was repeated at Hazira by Reliance Industries Ltd. (RIL) in 1987. In 1997, the detergent producer, Nirma Ltd., set up a 75-ktpa LAB plant
at Alindra, near Vadodara, as part of a backward integration strategy into basic detergent raw materials (the company went on to set up
a soda ash plant as well). The last greenfield investment in LAB production in India was 20 years ago, when Indian Oil Corporation (IOC)
commissioned a 120-ktpa plant at Panipat, which was debottlenecked to 152-ktpa in September 2022.

… leads to rising imports
For a brief while after IOC’s plant came on-stream, India was surplus in LAB, but that has changed dramatically since. Current Indian
demand for LAB is about 700-kt, but domestic production is only around 400-kt, leaving a significant chunk of demand to be catered by
imports. These currently come from the Middle East (Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Iran, Egypt), Southeast Asia (mainly Thailand), and Spain.

The top-five exporters of LAB to India in FY23, accounting for 95% of all imports, were Farabi Petrochemicals in Saudi Arabia (exports
of 143-kt), Iran Chemical Industries Investment Co. (ICIIC) in Iran (52-kt), LABIX Company Ltd. in Thailand (38-kt), CEPSA in Spain (32-kt),
and SEEF in Qatar (29-kt).

Chemical Weekly December 24, 2024 127

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