Posted on 02/08/2009 6:55:31 AM PST by nuconvert
The world's largest ethylene production complex, the Jam Petrochemical Plant, has been opened in the southern Iranian city of Asalouyeh.
The complex will boast of an annual production of 1,321,000 tons of ethylene, which is widely used in industry and medicine, IRNA reported.
The Jam Petrochemical Plant will increase its production to 4.2 million tons within the next few years.
The complex was inaugurated by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who was accompanied by Oil Minister Gholam-Hossein Nozari, on Sunday in his visit to the port city of Asalouyeh -- home to Iran's giant South Pars gas field in the Persian Gulf.
Phases 6, 7 and 8 of South Pars were opened in October 2008 with a total export capacity of 158,000 barrels of gas condensates and 4,450 tons of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) per day.
I wonder if they got their carbon permits, checked for endangered species, settled with the union, got the required water discharge permits, the required air discharged permits, had OSHA approve their worker safety program, completed their Environmental Impact Study, had federal judges block construction, complied with fire safety requirements, complied with energy conservation requirements, met their minority quota, met standards for access for the disabled, and gave back to the community.
Never mind, it wasn’t built in the United States.
...and people really expect us to EVER become productive again?
I worked in a US ethylene unit back in the 80's (won't say whose). The plant had been designed and built in the 1950's and is no longer in service. It had an open cycle water system, which means that the quench water that was used to cool the effluent off of the furnaces would eventually go to open settling basins, then to an open cooling tower where the water/hydrocarbon mix would go to atmosphere. We're talking thousands of TONS of benzene to the atmosphere yearly.
We did install a vacuum degasser to flash off and recover what we could, but at 7 psia not everything flashed. Plus the degasser could be brought down by the smallest pump failure, or a line being plugged with naphthalene, which happened weekly during the winter. It was a nasty and unhealthy way to start an engineering career.
Back then, the life expectancy of a ChE was late 40s.
My grandfather was a ChE and he died in an industrial accident at 39, in 1939.
“We’re talking thousands of TONS of benzene to the atmosphere yearly.”
I understand. I grew up in a part of the country that actually produced things (decades ago, of course), and clearly remember much of which you speak.
There has to be reasonable regulations...but the ones that are now written are intended to PUNISH this country for its past sins, not simply clean the air. Why do I know this...because I know the mindset of the people writing the regulations (and the Democrats in Congress who give them the marching orders).
We can get plants clean very easily at a low price (especially today), but we will never get them spotless. They’ll be in Brazil long before we ever get there.
What are they going to do with all that ethylene? They’re talking of over 8 billion pounds/year. I’m not aware of any polyethylene plants going up in the area to consume that much feedstock. The Kuwaiti’s are building a large petrochemical complex, but it includes its own ethylene crackers. What are the crazy Iranians planning to do with it?
Well, the US seems intent on burning its feedstock as fuel or wasting it for fertilizer to grow crops to burn, rather than generating ethylene, so the jump in price of ethylene was a cost that many people didn’t realize hit nearly every consumer good.
Target.
“Well, the US seems intent on burning its feedstock as fuel or wasting it for fertilizer to grow crops to burn, rather than generating ethylene, so the jump in price of ethylene was a cost that many people didn’t realize hit nearly every consumer good.”
Why should we have cared...we just borrowed money to cover it?
(and we’re about to borrow a boatload more)
There could be a huge fire there with little effort.
Yet Iran still needs to import something like half its gasoline. Are they expecting to take over the plastic toy market from China?
> Back then, the life expectancy of a ChE was late 40s.
No kidding! It was my third trip to the emergency room coughing blood that convinced me to dump my chemical engineering degree, go back to college and switch to electro-mechanical engineering. I haven’t played with chemicals, now, since 1979.
A refinery to get gasoline costs several times as much as an ethylene plant.
Just what I was thinking. It’d burn high, wide, and handsome.
Rocket fuel?
“Accession Number : ADA462373
Title : Design of a Premixed Gaseous Rocket Engine Injector for Ethylene and Oxygen
Descriptive Note : Master’s thesis
Corporate Author : NAVAL POSTGRADUATE SCHOOL MONTEREY CA
Personal Author(s) : Dausen, David F.
Handle / proxy Url : http://handle.dtic.mil/100.2/ADA462373 Check NTIS Availability...
Report Date : DEC 2006
Pagination or Media Count : 115
Abstract : A premixed gaseous rocket injector was designed and successfully operated over a limited range of fuel-rich operating conditions for the purpose of soot modeling for ethylene and oxygen mixtures. The injector had the advantage of delivering a homogenous mixture to the combustion chamber, lower soot production, and higher performance potential by removing the fuel atomization process which affects the combustion process and is inherent for non-premixed injectors. The premixed injector was operated at oxygen-fuel ratios from 1.0 to 1.8 with a mass flow of 0.024 kg/sec achieving a chamber pressure of 76 psi without propensity of flashback for 0.032” injector orifices. Increased mass flow rates of 0.027 kg/sec were achieved by increasing the injector orifice diameters to 0.0625” which produced a chamber pressure of 127 psi and a characteristic exhaust velocity efficiency of 90.1%. Flashback was eventually observed at an oxygen-to-fuel ratio of 1.2 where the pressure drop was across the injector was less than 388.6 kPa and the bulk mixture velocity through the injector orifices was approximately 90 m/s. Maintaining bulk velocity sufficiently above this value should prevent flashback from occurring, but will likely need to be characterized for additional orifice diameters and pressure differentials.
Descriptors : *OXYGEN, *ETHYLENE, *ROCKET ENGINES, *FUEL INJECTORS, SOOT, COMBUSTION CHAMBERS, THESES
Subject Categories : COMBUSTION AND IGNITION
ROCKET ENGINES
RECIPROCATING AND ROTATING ENGINES
Distribution Statement : APPROVED FOR PUBLIC RELEASE”
Time for the Israelis to pay them a visit!
Makes me glad I changed to software engineering..
Biggest hazard here is too much caffeine.
Time for one of those “INDUSTRIAL ACCIDENTS”.
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