India’s Reliance commissions refinery off-gas cracker at Jamnagar

LONDON (ICIS)–Reliance Industries has successfully commissioned and achieved design throughput at its refinery off-gas cracker (ROGC) complex at the integrated refining and petrochemicals production hub in Jamnagar, Gujarat state, the Indian energy and chemicals major said on Tuesday.

Reliance said that the complex – with a total 1.5m tonne/year capacity, along with downstream plants and utilities – is the world’s “first ever and largest” ROGC complex.

The complex uses off-gases from Reliance’s two refineries at Jamnagar as feedstock.

Ethylene from the ROGC is used in downstream plants to produce mono-ethylene glycol (MEG) and polyethylene (PE).

Similarly, propylene from the ROGC enhances output of the company’s existing polypropylene (PP) plants at the Jamnagar complex to produce high-value copolymers, it said.

The commissioning of the complex’s MEG plant marks completion of all-round expansion of the polyester value chain, following successful commissioning of paraxylene (PX), purified terephthalic acid (PTA), polyester filament and polyethylene terephthalate (PET) plants over last three years, the company said.

Meanwhile, the PE plants at Jamnagar, along with existing PE plants at other manufacturing sites, give Reliance the capability to produce the entire range of PE grades covering all end-uses in the Indian market, it added.

With the ROGC, along with imported ethane, Reliance has one of the “most competitive and flexible” cracker portfolios globally, it added.

The company’s combined ethylene capacity is now close to 4m tonnes/year from production at five manufacturing sites.

Globally, there are nearly 270 ethylene plants with a combined capacity of more than 170m tonnes/year, Reliance said.