MTO Projects Spur in Inner Mongolia

China’s Inner Mongolia is spurring with methanol investments through methanol-to-olefins (MTO) projects due to its cheap and abundant coal supply with estimated of nearly 10 million tonnes/year of methanol will be produced by the next 5 years.

MTO projects such as by Datang International Power has capacity of 1.7 million tonne/year methanol with around 1.5m tonnes will be converted to propylene using Lurgi’s technology as feedstock to make around 500,000 tonnes of polypropylene (PP).

The cost of polypropylene made from this route is expected to be cost competitive, given the low price of coal in Inner Mongolia using coal gasification technology from Shell with 3 tonnes of methanol are needed to produce 1 tonne of propylene through the process.

UOP to Develop More MTO Technology Plant

UOP is in the midst to expand its MTO technology projects. The Methanol-to-Olefins technology will be widespread in China, Middle East and North Africa looking at coal-based MTO plants in China.

This is after their first Eurochem MTO project in Nigeria is successful for construction and is due on stream in 2012. UOP is under way for another three projects in the Middle East and North Africa.

Nigeria Planning MTO Project Using UOP Technology

Nigeria will be home to 1.3 mil tonne per year capacity olefins complex using MTO technology by UOP in Lagos. The project is the first MTO technology that would be constructed at commercial-scale including olefins cracking process technologies by EuroChem.

The project would produce 10000 tonnes per day of methanol capacity from natural gas due for completion in 2012 and the MTO technology is expected to be more cost effective than traditional olefins production from crude oil-derived feedstocks.

Upon completion, the MTO plant would give a competitive edge against other petrochemical producers using normal technology such as steam cracker and dehydrogenation.