ExxonMobil Petrochemical Complex, Jurong Island, Singapore

ExxonMobil is set to become the largest petrochemicals company operating in Singapore. The company already has a 605,000bpd refinery operating on Jurong Island, as well as an existing petrochemical plant (completed in 2001 at a cost of $2bn), which has the capacity to produce 800,000t per year of ethylene and has downstream plants to produce polyethylene and polypropylene.

The new plant is a multibillion dollar project ($5bn-6bn) that broke ground in November 2007 (the final investment decision was made in September 2007) and was scheduled to be completed by early 2011; however, the project was delayed due to its scale and complexity.

The new plant will be completed in 2012 and the new petrochemical complex will be fully integrated with the existing refinery.

The combination of the two petrochemical plants will make Singapore one of the largest chemical-producing hubs.

The new plant will require an additional 400 workers when it comes onstream, and during the construction phase 10,000 personnel will be involved.

Production at ExxonMobil's new petrochemical plant

The new plant will consist of eight chemical-producing units with the ability to produce a range of basic petrochemicals. It will also incorporate units to produce value-added products from these chemicals for export to nearby expanding markets such as China.

The new complex will have a one million tonnes per year ethylene steam cracker, two 650,000t per year polyethylene units, a 450,000t per year polypropylene unit and a 300,000t per year speciality elastomers unit.

The complex will produce 340,000t per year of benzene from an aromatics unit, it will undergo a 125,000t oxo-alcohol unit expansion, a 80,000t per year paraxylene expansion and house a 220MW power cogeneration unit.

In April 2010, seven furnace modules arrived at the complex. Each module, measuring 50m in height and 2000t in weight, will be installed in the ethylene steam cracker. A special transport vessel, RollDock Sun, was used to transport the units from Thailand to Singapore.

Higher value products

The ExxonMobil Petrochemical project will make full use of existing ExxonMobil proprietary technologies to process a number of basic feedstocks into higher-value end-products. The speciality elastomers unit will produce the new metallocene-based Vistamaxx speciality elastomers for use in speciality films and polymer modification.

The speciality elastomers unit will be able to produce a range of products, including Exact plastomers, which are used in the automotive, consumer and construction industries.

The first of two polyethylene units will produce metallocene-based polyethylene resins, including Exceed for the production of high quality film for export.

The infrastructure at the plant will include finishing, packaging and shipping facilities. The combination of the original facility and the new facility will enable ExxonMobil to manufacture over two million tonnes of polyethylene per year.

Contractors for the ExxonMobil Petrochemical Complex

ExxonMobil has awarded contracts for different components of the plant. The steam cracker recovery unit and power cogeneration unit design, engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contract was awarded to The Shaw Group.

The steam cracker furnaces EPC contract was awarded to Mitsui Engineering & Shipbuilding and Heurtey Petrochem, and the EPC contract for the polypropylene unit and the speciality elastomers unit was awarded to Mitsui Engineering & Shipbuilding.

The EPC for the two polyethylene units was awarded to Mitsubishi Heavy Industries who are also responsible for the polyolefins finishing, packaging and shipping part of the project.

The project coordination and services and infrastructure EPC contract was awarded to Foster Wheeler and WorleyParsons.

The process control and instrumentation contract was awarded to Mustang Engineering.