Page 154 - CW E-Magazine (10-9-2024)

News from Abroad

DIFFERING VIEWS
Ineos Aromatics plant in Geel runs into operating

license hurdle

Ineos Aromatics, a leading player in already in the lowest quality class, ‘not
purified terephthalic acid (PTA) and good’, any deterioration of this para-
para-xylene (PX) production, has repor- meter is in principle prohibited,” it said.
tedly been asked to stop operations at Ineos Aromatics said it is “shocked” by
its Belgian site. the decision and is reviewing it with
legal advisers to consider the next steps.
The Council for Permit Disputes However, the company, which employs
has annulled the licence for Ineos around 360 people, disagreed that opera-
Aromatics to operate its factory located tions should cease immediately.
on the territory of Geel and Laakdal. gated whether the company’s cobalt
According to the council’s President, discharges were too harmful to the “We are happy to point out that in
the annulment means Ineos Aroma- water quality of the Grote Nete river. the event of the revocation of a new
tics must cease operations until a new licence without replacement, the appli-
licence can be obtained. However, The council agreed, stating that the cant has the right to continue operations
Ineos has denied this. The licence was environmental impact report prepared under the previous operating licence,
granted by the Flemish government last as part of the permit process showed which is reactivated, until the Environ-
year after the previous one expired. that the river would deteriorate based ment Minister makes a new decision.
Two nature groups appealed, saying the on the discharge standards. “As the So there is no question of closing down
government had not suffi ciently investi- cobalt pollution in the Grote Nete is operations,” the company said.

ACCELERATING COMMERCIALISATION
Sibur plans centre for piloting polymer technologies

Russian petrochemicals supplier, synthetic materials,” Sibur manage- The centre will have design capa-
Sibur, is building a centre for piloting ment board member and Managing city of up to 300-tpa. It will make
base polymer production technologies Director for development and innovation, it possible to test a broad range of
in Tobolsk at a cost of more than 6-bn Ms. Darya Borisova said. brands of polyethylene and polypro-
rubles ($65-mn), the company said. pylene, Russian production of which
Sibur expects the new centre to reduce The centre will initially work on totals 5.3-mtpa with potential to grow
the time it takes to get new products on meeting the company’s own needs, to 6-mtpa by 2028, and do this in
the market by ten times. SIBUR said. various regimes and confi gurations,
Sibur said.
“Previously all lab developments “The hardware confi guration of the
were sent for testing immediately to the project provides the possibility to test Construction of the centre is sche-
production facility, but now we will be more than 90% of the range of exist- duled for completion by the end of
able to test them at a separate centre, ing and prospective technologies for September, which will be followed by
without taking the company’s main production of base polymers, which pre-commissioning and comprehensive
production facilities out of commercial makes it one of a kind in the world,” testing with production of trial products
operation for this. Given that there are the company said. The centre will also at the end of this year.
plans to annually test at least fi ve cata- test the company’s solutions for pro-
lysts and test the launch of about ten duction of catalysts, including chrome, The company also plans to open
new brands of polymers in Tobolsk, titanium-magnesium and metallocene. a centre for researching and scaling
the positive effect for processing sec- In future, the centre will also open ad- technologies in Kazan by 2027 and is
tors can be measured in the hundreds of ditional possibilities for licensing these considering building a plant to produce
thousands of additional tonnes of modern technologies, not just developing them. catalysts in Tatarstan.

154 Chemical Weekly September 10, 2024

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