A cracking furnace with a 150,000-ton annual capacity developed jointly by the Tianhua Chemical Machinery and Automation Research and Design Institute, the Sinopec Beijing Construction Engineering Co (SEI), and the Beijing Institute of Chemical Industry, passed a Sinopec technical appraisal on May 11, with all cracking-furnace technical indexes at the advanced international level.
This China-developed Zhenhai twin cracking furnace is currently the biggest cracking furnace in the country. It was put to use on July 26, 2010, at Zhenhai Refining and Chemical Plant’s 1-million-ton ethylene facility, a key project for the 11th Five-Year Plan.
Now, after having operated for a year and having been properly evaluated, the unit’s selectivity, thermal efficiency, and production capacity have reached or surpassed design standards, and it has been shown to be stable and reliable. Its advantages include cost efficiency, economical use of space, and certain other economic and social benefits.
The use of the 150,000-ton cracking furnace over this length of time shows that Chinese cracking technology has reached a new level and that its ethylene cracking technology is among the best in the world.