With the continuous improvement of global refining capacity, the increasingly stringent oil product standards, and the continuous increase in the demand for chemical raw materials, the consumption of refining catalysts has been in a steady growth trend. Among them, the fastest growth is in new economies and developing countries.
Due to the different raw materials, products and device structures of each refinery, for the use of more targeted catalysts to get the ideal product or chemical raw materials, the choice of catalysts with better adaptability or selectivity can solve the key problems of different refineries and different devices.
In recent years, in Asia Pacific, Africa and the Middle East, the consumption amount and growth rate of all catalysts, including refining, polymerization, chemical synthesis, etc. are higher than that of developed regions in Europe and the United States.
In the future, the expansion of gasoline hydrogenation will be the largest, followed by middle distillate hydrogenation, FCC, isomerization, hydrocracking, naphtha hydrogenation, heavy oil (residual oil) hydrogenation, alkylation (superposition), reforming, etc., and the corresponding catalyst demand will also increase correspondingly.
However, due to the different use cycles of various oil refining catalysts, the amount of oil refining catalysts can not increase with the expansion of capacity. According to market sales statistics, the most sales are hydrogenation catalysts (hydrotreating and hydrocracking, accounting for 46% of the total), followed by FCC catalysts (40%), followed by reforming catalysts (8%), alkylation catalysts (5%) and others (1%).
Here are the main features of catalysts from several internationally renowned companies:
10 internationally renowned catalyst companies
1. Grace Davison, USA
Grace Corporation was founded in 1854 and is headquartered in Columbia, Maryland. Grace Davidson is the world leader in the research and production of FCC catalysts and is the world’s largest supplier of FCC and hydrogenation catalysts.
The company has two global business operating units, Grace Davison and Grace Specialty Chemicals, and eight product divisions. Grace Davidson’s business includes FCC catalysts, hydrotreating catalysts, specialty catalysts including polyolefin catalysts and catalyst carriers, and silicon-based or silical-aluminum-based engineering materials for digital media coatings on industrial, consumer, and inkjet printing papers. The hydrotreating catalyst business is operated by ART, a joint venture company.
2, Albemarle American specialty chemicals (ALbemarle) Group
In 1887, Arbel Paper Company was founded in Richmond, Virginia.
In 2004, Akzo-Nobel Oil refining catalyst business was acquired, officially entered the field of oil refining catalysts, and formed the catalyst business unit with polyolefin catalysts; Become the second largest FCC catalyst producer in the world.
At present, it has more than 20 production plants in North America, Europe, the Middle East, South America, Japan and China.
Arpels has 8 R&D centers in 5 countries and sales offices in more than 40 countries. It is the world’s largest producer of brominated flame retardants, covering daily use, electronics, pharmaceuticals, agricultural products, automotive industry, construction and packaging materials.
The main business includes polymer additives, catalysts and fine chemistry three parts.
There are four main types of polymer additives: flame retardants, antioxidants, curing agents and stabilizers;
Catalyst business has three parts: refining catalyst, polyolefin catalyst, chemical catalyst;
Fine Chemicals Business composition: functional chemicals (paints, alumina), fine chemicals (bromine chemicals, oilfield chemicals) and intermediates (pharmaceuticals, pesticides).
Among the three business segments of Alpels company, the annual sales revenue of polymer additives used to be the largest, followed by catalysts, and the sales revenue of fine chemicals was the least, but in the past two years, the annual sales revenue of catalyst business has gradually increased, and since 2008, it has exceeded the polymer additives business.
Catalyst business is the main business segment of Arpell. Arpels is the world’s second largest supplier of hydrotreating catalysts (30% of the global market share) and one of the top three catalytic cracking catalyst suppliers in the world.
3. Dow Chemicals
Dow Chemical is a diversified chemical company headquartered in Michigan, USA, founded in 1897 by Herbert Henry Dow. It operates 214 production bases in 37 countries, with more than 5,000 kinds of products, widely used in more than 10 fields such as automobiles, building materials, electricity, and medicine. In 2009, Dow ranked 127th on the Fortune Global 500 and 34th on the Fortune National 500. In terms of total assets, it is the second largest chemical company in the world, second only to DuPont Chemical of the United States; In terms of annual revenue, it is also the world’s second largest chemical company, after Germany’s BASF; More than 46,000 employees worldwide; It is divided into 7 business segments by product type: Functional Plastics, Functional Chemicals, Agricultural Sciences, Plastics, Basic Chemicals, Hydrocarbons and Energy, Venture Capital. The Catalysts business is part of the Functional Chemicals segment.
Dow’s catalysts include: NORMAX™ carbonyl synthesis catalyst; METEOR™ catalyst for ethylene oxide/ethylene glycol; SHAC™ and SHAC™ ADT polypropylene catalysts; DOWEX™ QCAT™ bisphenol A catalyst; It is the world’s leading producer of polypropylene catalysts.
4. ExxonMobil
Exxonmobil is the world’s largest oil company, headquartered in Texas, USA. The company, formerly known as Exxon Corporation and Mobil Corporation, was merged and reorganized on November 30, 1999. The company is also the parent company of ExxonMobil, Mobil and Esso worldwide.
Founded in 1882, Exxon is the largest oil company in the United States and one of the seven largest and oldest oil companies in the world. Founded in 1882, Mobil Corporation is a comprehensive multinational company integrating exploration and development, refining and petrochemical industry.
Exxon and Mobil have upstream headquarters in Houston, downstream headquarters in Fairfax, and corporate headquarters in Irving, Texas. Exxon owns 70% of the company and Mobil owns 30%. Exxonmobil, through its affiliates, currently operates in approximately 200 countries and territories around the world and employs more than 80,000 people.
Exxonmobil’s main products include oil and gas, oil products and petrochemical products, is the world’s largest olefins monomer and polyolefin producer, including ethylene, propylene, polyethylene, polypropylene; The catalysts business is owned by ExxonMobil Chemical. Exxonmobil Chemical is divided into four business segments: polymers, polymer films, chemical products and technology, and catalysts belong to the technology segment.
UNIVATION, a 50-50 joint venture between ExxonMobil and Dow Chemical Company, owns the UNIPOL™ polyethylene production technology and the UCAT™ and XCAT™ branded polyolefin catalysts.
5. UOP Global Oil Products Company
Founded in 1914 and headquartered in Desprine, Illinois, Global Oil Products is a global company. On November 30, 2005, UOP became a wholly owned subsidiary of Honeywell as part of Honeywell’s Specialty Materials strategic business.
UOP operates in eight segments: renewable energy and Chemicals, adsorbents, specialty and custom products, petroleum refining, Aromatics and derivatives, linear alkyl benzene and advanced olefins, Light olefins and equipment, natural gas processing, and services.
UOP provides design, engineering, consulting services, licensing and services, process technology and production of catalysts, molecular sieves, adsorbents and specialized equipment for the petroleum refining, petrochemical and natural gas processing industries, with 65 technology licenses available.
UOP is the world’s largest zeolite and aluminum phosphate zeolite supplier with more than 150 zeolite products for dewatering, removing trace impurities and product separation of refinery gas and liquid materials. The annual production capacity of molecular sieve reaches 70,000 tons. In the field of molecular sieve adsorbents, UOP holds 70% of the world market share.
UOP is also the world’s largest producer of alumina, with products including pseudo-alumina, beta-alumina, gamma-alumina and α-alumina, providing activated alumina and aluminum/silica-aluminum spherical carriers.
UOP has more than 9,000 patents worldwide and has built nearly 4,000 devices using its patents in more than 80 countries. Sixty percent of the world’s gasoline is produced using UOP technology. Nearly half of the world’s biodegradable detergents are produced using UOP technology. Of the 36 major refining processes currently used in the oil industry, 31 were developed by UOP. At present, UOP manufactures about 100 different catalyst and adsorbent products for its licensed technologies and other companies, which are used in refining fields such as reforming, isomerization, hydrocracking, hydrofining and oxidative desulphurization, as well as in petrochemical fields including the production of aromatics (benzene, toluene and xylene), propylene, butene, ethylbenzene, styrene, isopropylbenzene and cyclohexane.
UOP main catalysts include: catalytic reforming catalyst, C4 isomerization catalyst, C5 and C6 isomerization catalyst, xylene isomerization catalyst, hydrocracking catalyst has two types of hydrocracking and mild hydrocracking, hydrotreating catalyst, oil desulfurization agent, sulfur recovery, tail gas conversion and other oil refining adsorbents.
6, ART American advanced refining technology company
Advanced Refining Technologies was formed in 2001 as a 50-50 joint venture between Chevron Oil Products and Grace-Davidson. ART was founded to integrate the technological strengths of Grace and Chevron to develop and sell hydrogenation catalysts to the global refining industry, and is the world’s largest hydrogenation catalyst producer, supplying more than 50% of the world’s hydrogenation catalysts.
ART connects its products and services through the sales departments and offices of Grace Corporation and Chevron Corporation worldwide.
ART has four catalyst production plants and one catalyst research center. ART manufactures catalysts for hydrocracking, mild hydrocracking, isomerization dewaxing, isomerization reforming and hydrofining.
The main catalysts include Isocracking® for isomerization, Isofinishing® for isomerization, hydrocracking, mild hydrocracking, hydrofining, hydrotreating, residual hydrotreating.
7. Univation Inc
Univation, founded in 1997 and headquartered in Houston, Texas, is a 50:50 joint venture between ExxonMobil Chemical Company and Dow Chemical Company.
Univation specializes in the transfer of UNIPOL™ fumed polyethylene technology and catalysts, and is the world’s leading technology licensor and global supplier of catalysts for the polyethylene industry. It is the world’s second largest manufacturer and supplier of polyethylene catalysts, accounting for 30% of the global market. The company’s catalysts are manufactured at its Mont Belvieu, Seadrift and Freeport facilities in Texas.
Univation’s polyethylene manufacturing process, known as UNIPOL™, currently has more than 100 polyethylene production lines in operation or under construction using UNIPOL™ in 25 countries, accounting for more than 25% of the world’s total.
The main catalysts are: 1)UCAT™ chromium catalyst and Ziegler-Natta catalyst; 2)XCAT™ metallocene catalyst, trade name EXXPOL; 3)PRODIGY™ Bimodal Catalyst; 4)UT™ deaeration catalyst.
8. BASF
Headquartered in Munich, Germany, BASF is one of the world’s largest integrated chemical companies with more than 8,000 products, including high value-added chemicals, plastics, dyes, automotive coatings, plant protection agents, pharmaceuticals, fine chemicals, oil and gas.
Basf is the world’s largest producer of maleic anhydride, acrylic acid, aniline, caprolactam and foamed styrene. Polypropylene, polystyrene, hydroxyl alcohol and other products ranked second in the world; Ethylbenzene, styrene production capacity ranks third in the world. Basf is one of the world’s largest suppliers of feed additives, including mono-vitamins, multivitamins, carotenoids, lysines, enzymes and feed preservatives.
Basf has six separate business units: Chemicals, Plastics, Functional Solutions, Performance Products, Agrochemicals and Oil &Gas.
Basf is the only company in the world that covers the entire catalyst business, with more than 200 types of catalysts. It mainly includes: oil refining catalyst (FCC catalyst), automotive catalyst, chemical catalyst (copper chromium catalyst and ruthenium catalyst, etc.), environmental protection catalyst, oxidation dehydrogenation catalyst and dehydrogenation purification catalyst.
Basf is the world’s second largest producer of FCC catalysts, with approximately 12% of the world market share for refining catalysts.
9. BP British Oil Company
BP is one of the world’s largest upstream and downstream integrated multinational oil companies, headquartered in London, UK; The company’s business covers more than 100 countries and regions, including oil and gas exploration and production, refining and marketing, renewable energy three main areas; BP is divided into three business divisions: Oil and Gas Exploration and Production, Refining and Marketing, and other businesses (renewable energy and Marine). BP’s catalysts business is part of the Refining and Marketing Division.
Petrochemical products include two categories, the first category is aromatic and acetic acid series products, mainly including PTA, PX and acetic acid; The second category is olefins and their derivatives, mainly including ethylene, propylene and downstream derivative products. BP’s PTA(the main raw material for the production of polyester), PX(the main raw material for the production of PTA) and acetic acid production capacity rank first in the world. BP has developed a proprietary technology for PX production based on its own proprietary isomerization catalyst and efficient crystallization technology. BP has a leading patented technology for the production of Cativa® acetic acid.
BP’s olefins and derivatives business is primarily located in China and Malaysia.
10, Sud-Chemie German Southern Chemical Company
Founded in 1857, the Southern Chemical Company is a highly innovative multinational specialty chemicals listed company with more than 150 years of history, headquartered in Munich, Germany.
Nanfang Chemical Company directly or indirectly owns a total of 77 subsidiary companies, including 5 domestic companies in Germany, 72 foreign companies, respectively belong to the adsorbent and catalyst two divisions, for the petrochemical, food processing, consumer goods, casting, water treatment, environmental protection and other industries to provide high-performance catalyst, adsorbent and additive products and solutions.
The catalyst business of Nanfang Chemical Company belongs to the catalyst Division. The division consists of Catalyst Technology, Energy and Environment.
The Catalyst Technology division is divided into four global business groups: chemical reaction catalysts, petrochemical catalysts, oil refining catalysts and polymerization catalysts.
The catalyst varieties of Nanfang Chemical mainly include: raw material purification catalyst, petro chemical catalyst, chemical catalyst, oil refining catalyst, olefin polymerization catalyst, air purification catalyst, fuel cell catalyst.
Note: At present, Southern Chemical Company (SUD-Chemie) has been acquired by Clariant!
Post time: Aug-17-2023
