Hydrocarbon Processing - September 2022 - 92

History of the HPI
operations and invest in increasing processing
complexity.
To mitigate wild fluctuations in crude
oil prices, OPEC tried to stabilize the
market by implementing production
cuts. The OPEC London agreement of
1983 was a notable action taken by the
cartel to try and prevent a crude oil price
collapse (FIG. 1). The agreement contained
two important accords: OPEC
lowered the benchmark price of its light
crude oil by $5/bbl to $29/bbl and
agreed to cut production rates.184
This
was a historic occasion, as it was the first
time that the cartel had lowered oil prices.
By 1985, global oil production had
declined from nearly 64 MMbpd in 1980
to less than 57 MMbpd.185
However, many OPEC nations disregarded
agreed-upon production cuts and
began to increase production rates. In late
1985, tired of trying to stabilize the oil
market, Saudi Arabia boosted oil production,
flooding the already oversupplied
market. By March 1986, the tremendous
spike in crude oil supplies led to prices
collapsing to $10/bbl-adjusted for
inflation, prices collapsed from nearly
$140/bbl in early 1980 to nearly $27.50/
bbl in 1Q 1986.186,187
Within a 15-yr
timespan, the world had experienced
three major oil price crises. It would not
be for several years afterwards that the
global oil market would fall into balance.
However, it would not be the last oil price
collapse or spike the global oil market
would see. Several other significant price
swings would occur over the next 30 yr.
A new coal gasification process. Due
to the effects of the oil crises in the 1970s
(especially the oil embargo of 1973), several
nations conducted extensive research
on finding alternative energy sources to
produce fuels and chemicals besides using
crude oil as a feedstock. The stark increase
in crude oil prices significantly increased
both refiners' and petrochemical
producers' feedstock costs-most petrochemicals
produced at the time used oilderived
feedstocks; the same is true today.
In an effort to wean off using highpriced
petroleum feedstocks for fuels and
chemical products production, several
companies set their sights on coal gasification
and coal liquefaction technologies.
Since coal was a cheap commodity, converting
it into transportation fuels and/
or using it as a feedstock for petrochemicals
production looked to be a viable alternative
vs. using high-priced crude oil.
Coal gasification/liquefaction technologies
were not new at the time. Technologies
such
as the Bergius process
decades. Countries with
and Fischer-Tropsch process had been
around for
FIG. 1. OPEC's extraordinary meeting in
London in 1983 to try and stabilize the
global oil market. The outcome of the
meeting became known as the OPEC London
agreement of 1983. Photo courtesy of OPEC.
abundant supplies of coal reserves could
make use of existing coal gasification/
liquefaction technologies to not only
produce fuels and petrochemicals at a
cost-effective rate, but also strengthen
domestic energy security.
As global oil prices stabilized, many efforts
to switch to other feedstocks fizzled
out.188
Conversely, the Eastman Chemical
FIG. 2. View of Eastman Chemicals Co.'s
Kingsport plant in Tennessee (U.S.), the site
of the company's proprietary coal gasification
process. Photo courtesy of the American
Chemical Society.
92 SEPTEMBER 2022 | HydrocarbonProcessing.com
Co. continued research and development
on coal-derived chemicals production.
Like many chemical companies in the
1970s, Eastman was heavily dependent
on crude oil and natural gas to produce
petrochemicals. However, the company's
petrochemical facility in northeast Tennessee
(U.S.) was in close proximity to
vast coal reserves in the Appalachian region
of the eastern U.S.189
In the mid-1970s, Eastman conducted
extensive research on utilizing coal to
produce chemicals, especially acetic anhydride.
At the time, the company consumed
more than 1 Blb/yr of acetic anhydride
to produce various products. Acetic
anhydride was first synthesized by French
chemist Charles Frédéric Gerhardt in
1852; it is used to produce acetate fibers,
plastics, coatings and film.189,190,191
The
company began pilot plant operations in
1977, followed by construction and operations
on a commercial facility in 1980
and 1983, respectively.
According to literature,189
the facility
used several different technologies to
produce acetic anhydride from coal. Synthesis
gas was produced using the Texaco
Coal Gasification Process. The proprietary
coal gasification technology would
eventually be licensed by ChevronTexaco
after the companies merged in 2001. It
fell into the hands of GE Energy after the
company purchased ChevronTexaco's
gasification business in 2004. Air Products
became the current owner of the
technology after purchasing the GE gasification
business in 2018.192,193
According to literature,189
the coal gasification
process used oxygen and coal/
water slurry as feedstock for a gasifier,
which used high temperature and pressure
to produce two gas streams: shifted gas
and raw synthesis gas. The two product
gas streams left the gasifier and were purified-hydrogen
sulfide (H2
dioxide (CO2
S) and carbon
) were removed via the RecS
was converted to elwas
recovered and
The
tisol process (licensed by Linde and Air
Liquide). The H2
emental sulfur in a Shell Claus offgas treating
unit, while the CO2
sold to make carbonated beverages.186
purified raw synthesis gas was cryogenically
separated into hydrogen and carbon
monoxide, with hydrogen used for methanol
production and the carbon monoxide
used for acetic anhydride production.189
The final step used an Eastman proprietary
reactive distillation process and catalyst
system to produce acetic anhydride-
purified carbon monoxide reacted with
methyl acetate to form acetic anhydride.189
In May 1983, operations began at the
Kingsport plant (FIG. 2), which became
the first U.S. facility to use a novel coal
gasification process to produce a modern
generation of industrial chemicals.189
Liquid crystals and conducting
polymers. For more than 30 yr, electronic
providers have produced items such as
cell phones, personal computers/laptops
and televisions with ever-increasing ultra
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