The strategic value of China's modern coal chemical industry is becoming increasingly apparent. Reporters from the Economic Information Daily recently learned during interviews in Ordos, Inner Mongolia, a national modern coal chemical industry demonstration zone, that after years of strenuous efforts and breakthroughs, China's modern coal chemical technology has significantly matured. It has successfully 'unlocked the magic' of transforming coal into various chemical products such as oil, natural gas, olefins, and ethylene glycol, paving the way for clean, efficient coal utilization and presenting an alternative to petroleum. Its strategic importance is now clearly emerging. In Ordos, the technology for producing various fuels and chemical products from coal, including diesel, naphtha, natural gas, methanol, olefins (such as ethylene and propylene), and ethylene glycol, has now reached maturity.
Near Wulanmulun Town in Yijinholuo Banner, Ordos, a large factory resembling an oil refinery stands prominently. This facility houses the world's first, and currently only, industrial-scale direct coal liquefaction production line for oil, which has garnered considerable domestic and international attention since its inception. Reporters learned that this million-ton-capacity facility, constructed by Shenhua Group with an investment exceeding tens of billions of yuan, officially commenced commercial operations in 2011. Washed refined coal, transported from nearby mines, is first pulverized into a fine powder. It then enters a 1.2-kilometer-long production line for catalytic and other treatments. After just 24 hours, products such as diesel as clear as mineral water, naphtha, and liquefied petroleum gas are produced. This 'magical transformation' is truly astonishing. Hu Qingbin, Deputy Chief Engineer of Shenhua Ordos Coal-to-Oil Branch Company, stated that entering the new century, Shenhua Group focused its efforts on researching and developing clean coal utilization technologies, such as coal-to-oil production. They independently developed a complete set of million-ton-scale direct coal liquefaction technology and catalysts. By the end of 2017, the company had obtained 108 invention patents for its direct coal liquefaction technology, and its core technology had received patent authorization in 9 countries and regions, including the United States, Russia, and the European Union.
The production line successfully commenced trial production by the end of 2008, subsequently achieving long-period, safe, and stable operation. Last year, it produced a total of 860,000 tons of products including diesel. While the designed single operating cycle for the production line is 310 days, its last two operating cycles were 420 days and 410 days respectively, demonstrating the increasing maturity of the technology. Currently, construction plans for the second and third production lines are underway.
Modern coal chemical technologies, such as coal-to-natural gas and coal-to-olefins, are also making continuous strides. The Huineng 2 billion cubic meters/year coal-to-natural gas project, located in Yijinhuoluo Banner, Ordos City, is the second coal-to-natural gas demonstration project approved in the country. Since 2015, its Phase I project, with an annual capacity of 400 million cubic meters, has achieved safe, stable, long-period, and full-load operation. In May this year, construction also began on its Phase II project, which has an annual capacity of 1.6 billion cubic meters.
"The domestic natural gas market demand is robust, and since the project's commissioning, the supply of liquefied natural gas has been unable to meet demand," said Liu Jianqiang, General Manager of Inner Mongolia Huineng Coal Chemical Co., Ltd. He added that the company, in collaboration with numerous domestic research institutions, has overcome technical challenges in synthesizing natural gas from thermal coal. The synthesized natural gas can achieve a methane content of 97%, and the purity of liquefied natural gas reaches 99.9%. For every 1,000 cubic meters of natural gas, approximately 2.2 tons of coal and less than 7 tons of water are consumed, both superior to the initial design values. Beyond replacing petrochemical products, technologies for producing new materials such as graphene and carbon fiber from coal are also continuously achieving new breakthroughs.
Since 2013, ENN Group has developed a technology to extract graphene from low-calorific-value coal. The Phase I project, a 1,000-ton graphene production facility, commenced construction this March in Dalad Banner, Ordos City. Qu Bo, the project's General Manager, stated that 3 tons of low-calorific-value coal can yield 1 ton of graphene powder. The Phase I project is expected to be operational by August this year, which will fill a technological gap in this field.
Yigao (Inner Mongolia) Coal Chemical Technology Co., Ltd.) has successfully developed technology for extracting products such as carbon fiber and super activated carbon materials from high-temperature coal tar, following two years of pilot testing. The first phase of a production line, with an annual capacity of 10,000 tons, began construction in April this year in Jungar Banner, Ordos City, and is planned to be put into operation in November this year. "Oil, gas, olefins, composite materials..." some enterprise executives and experts state that modern coal chemical technology is advancing rapidly, with new technological breakthroughs and projects being launched almost every year.
Growing Industry Scale
Investigations by journalists have found that, driven by national-level demonstration projects, the scale of modern coal chemical industries such as coal-to-oil, coal-to-natural gas, and coal-to-olefins has grown significantly in recent years, showing a trend towards large-scale, integrated chain, and clustered development. By the end of last year, the Zhongtian Hechuang Coal Deep Processing National Demonstration Project, located in Uxin Banner, Ordos City, was fully put into operation. With a total investment exceeding 50 billion yuan, this project can convert 8 million tons of coal annually and is designed to produce 3.6 million tons of methanol and 1.37 million tons of olefins per year. It is currently the largest coal chemical integration project in the country.
Inner Mongolia Yitai Group is one of the earliest coal enterprises in China to enter the coal-to-oil field. Since 2002, Yitai Group, in collaboration with the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shenhua Group, and Lu'an Group, jointly established Synfuels China Technology Co., Ltd., which developed a complete set of coal indirect liquefaction technology and high-efficiency catalysts. The 160,000 tons/year coal indirect liquefaction industrial demonstration project built by them has been successfully operating for 9 years since its successful trial production in 2009. Furthermore, after technological upgrades in recent years, the annual capacity of this demonstration project has increased to 200,000 tons.
The industry is also showing a trend towards clustered development. Since the construction of the Yitai 1.2 million tons/year fine chemical project in Hangjin Banner, it has successively attracted 11 upstream and downstream supporting enterprises to settle around the project. These enterprises can produce dozens of chemical products such as high-melting-point synthetic wax, liquid paraffin, and stable light hydrocarbons, thus forming an integrated upstream and downstream ecological industrial chain.
Hu Qingbin, Deputy Chief Engineer of Shenhua Erdos Coal-to-Liquid Branch Company, stated that currently, the first million-ton-scale coal direct liquefaction production line has an integrated coal consumption of 3.5 tons per ton of oil product, with approximately 1 ton being fuel coal. This line can achieve a breakeven point when crude oil prices are between 55-60 US dollars. After the second and third production lines are completed, the oil recovery rate will increase by nearly 10%, and the breakeven point will drop below 50 US dollars per barrel.
Notably, the special coal-based oil products developed by Shenhua Erdos Coal-to-Liquid Branch Company can be used for both civilian and military purposes. For instance, the general-purpose diesel for ground equipment they developed has a low pour point and successfully passed extreme cold tests at China's Zhongshan Station in Antarctica, making it suitable for all-terrain use. Furthermore, its quality is stable, making it suitable for strategic storage. Coal-based aviation jet fuel has entered the trial production and application testing phase. In February of this year, coal-based aerospace kerosene was successfully tested for the first time on a new type of heavy rocket engine. Other special coal-based oil products, such as coal-based fuel for naval vessels, are also under development. The development of these related special coal-based oil products holds significant importance for ensuring national energy security.
In the past, domestic production of olefin products primarily relied on petroleum. The breakthrough in coal-to-olefins technology is of great significance for alleviating the country's petroleum supply pressure. Entrepreneurs indicated that as modern coal chemical technology matures and the industrial scale expands, there is still room for further reduction in indicators such as coal consumption, water consumption, production costs, and investment per unit of capacity. Energy conversion efficiency and product quality will also be further enhanced. (Source: Xinhua Energy Net)
