Page 27 - Industrial Plants

A sustainable Methanol Initiative

Coming true in Europe

Wood is fully supporting Perstorp, a global leader in specialty
chemicals, for “Project Air”, the ground-breaking initiative to cut
CO2 emissions by half a million tons, producing sustainable
methanol feedstock as raw material for derivatives production

Francesco Croci, Principal Process Engineer
Wood

Figure 1 – Aerial view of existing Perstorp’s facilities at Stenungsund, Sweden

erstorp, a global leading specialty portion of Perstorp’s specialty chemicals’ offering. The
chemicals producer, has historically project is carried out by Perstorp in cooperation with
based its production portfolio on Uniper and once completed it will cut carbon emissions
conventional fossil-derived feedstocks up to half million tons yearly [2]. The
as chemical building blocks and the importance of such initiative is “The project scope
Pmethanol is one among the key raw internationally recognized: the envisages the
materials. Methanol is nowadays identified as an European Innovation Fund – CINEA revamping of an
essential feedstock to produce synthetic hydrocarbons, [3] supports the Project under an existing partial
intermediates, and polymers. Its direct derivatives by agreement funding 97 million euro, oxidation plant
market share are formaldehyde, methyl-tert-butyl ether while the Swedish Energy Agency and the greenfield
(MTBE), acetic acid and dimethyl ether (DME). A will contribute with approximately 30 design of a methanol
number of daily products such as resins, adhesives, million euro. Project Air is now in its unit, facing the true
plastics, silicones and paints are derived from methanol FEED phase, developed by energy transition
[1] and used in several sectors embracing automotive, Perstorp’s engineering partner Wood challenge
electronics, coatings, insulations and construction. and will target the final investment
The carbon neutrality is nowadays a must for all the decision in 2025 to be in full scale
industry sectors and Project Air is an industrial initiative operation in 2028.
aimed to transform a variety of side and flue streams The new sustainable methanol plant will be built in an
and hydrogen from electrolysis into sustainable existing production site of Perstorp at Stenungsund,
methanol, thus reducing the carbon footprint of a wide Sweden (Figure 1): the downstream section of the new

IndustrIal Plants - May 2024
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