My Jurong Island Tour

My Jurong island tour continue from yesterday. Yesterday, I get a chance to see Biohazard Level 2 lab, I was liked wow, so dangerous lab and they still let us pass that area. I have a chance to see the large hydrocracker unit in Exxon Mobil which is exactly the same shape as what I learn in Petrochemical module.

The heat exchanger is very huge and the largest diameter storage tank is 104 metre. Exxon Mobil is still expanding very rapidly and now going larger. Different part of Jurong island is undergoing expanding and reclamation project to make a large industrialising estate.

I also saw a lot of workers cycling around the plants to collect samples and let the process run, it is quite fun and I think they employ a lot of people especially companies like Exxon Mobil.

I am going to introduce to you the first company in Jurong island which is Petrochemical Corporation of Singapore. PCS' ethylene plants incorporate the latest technology, allowing for the flexible use of naphtha, gas oil and LPG to achieve the most economical mix of feedstocks. they also supply utilities such as seawater, steam, compressed air as well as provide common facilities and services to ensure the efficient and safe operation of the complex.

The capacities of their 2 crackers total more to more than 1 million tonnes a year of ethylene and more than 600000 tonnes of proylene per year. They also produce acetylene, butadiene, 1-butene, MTBE, benzene, toluene and xylene. Products that are not consumed in the complex are exported to the region.

PCS is an upstream company while their customers are the down stream company. PCS is very important in Jurong island, without them, many companies will be affected. The downstream companies are Chevron Phillips Singapore Chemicals, celanese Singapore Pte Ltd, Ethylene Glycols Ptd Ltd, Mitsui Elastomers Singapore Pte Ltd, The polyolefine Company Pte Ltd, Seraya Chemicals Singapore Ptd Ltd, Singapore Acrylic Pte Ltd, Rohm and Haas Chemicals Singapore Pte Ltd, Tetra Chemicals Pte Ltd, Singapore methyl Methacrylate Pte Ltd, Denka Singapore Private Limited.

Jurong island is developed by Singapore Government to serve as a world class hub for the oil and petrochemical industry. Since March 1995, intensive land reclamation has taken place to merge seven of Singapore's Southern island, including Merbau, into a 3200 hectare self contained petrochemical island. It is now home to more than 70 leading petroleum, petrochemical and chemical companies. More is expected as there is still room on Jurong island for further expansion of Singapore chemical industry.

Jurong island is now linked to the Singapore mainland by an eight-lane highway. Travelling time to and from the mainland through the road link is shorten considerably. This helped to reduce transportation and operating costs.

Products such as textiles, furniture, fabrics, carpeting, paints, luggages, electrical appliances, kitchen accessories, detergents, automotive products, computers, digital hi-fi, audio-visual consumer products, telecommunication, agriculture, packaging, building, medical, surgical equipment are all made from Jurong island chemical plants.

Some of the paid up capital are shown here. PCS paid up capital is about $343353500. Seraya Chemicals has the highest paid up capital of about $1194000000 and its shareholder is Shell Eastern Petroleum Limited.

Singapore Exxon Mobil is the largest refinery in the world today. The refinery converts the raw material either crude oil or condensate into finished products that are marketed through the supply chain eg. LPG, motor gasoline, jet fuel, diesel fuel, lubricating oils, bunker fuel and asphalt. Intermediate that are consumed internally as chemical feedstock or fuel eg. fuel gas, hydrogen, naphtha, reformate, distillates and fuel oil.

These raw materials are transformed into products through a number of unit operations such as fractionation, conversion, treating and blending. Fractionation is the separation of hydrocarbon in distillation towers into groups of hydropcarbons in distillation tower into groups of hydrocarbon compounds of different boiling point ranges called "fractions" or "cuts".

Conversion or chemical reaction changes the size or structure of the hydrocarbon molecules. Conversion may result in a decomposition, unification or isomerisation of the feed molecules. Treating processes prepare hydrocarbon streams for additional processing or finishing operations. It involves the removal or separation of impurituies and other undesirable components. Blending is the proces of mixiing and combing hydrocarbon fractions, additive and other components to produce finished products with specific performance properties.

Let me introduce more companies in Jurong island. The following picture is Singapore Olefins Plant. By looking at it, you know that it is a steam cracking unit which convert naphtha to ethylene. We learn this in Petrochemical Processes. Ethylene is then used as a basic building block for making polyethylene and detergents. Propylene is also produced in this cracker which is used to make polypropylene and carpeting.



Now I am going to introduce to you the Singapore Polyolefins Plant. This plant is the downstream process of Singapore Olefins Plant which make Polyethene and Polypropylene in the form of resins. Look at the shape of the reactor, it has a big top and small bottom, if I am not wrong, it is a fluidized bed polymerisation reactor. The following image represent the description.



Now I am going to introduce Singapore Oxo Alcohol plant, this is the plant that convert butylene (product of steam cracking) to Isononyl Alcohol and Isopar. Isononyl Alcohol is used to manufacture of plasticisers which provide flexibility to many products. Isopar is used as a carrier fluids for household products like degreasers adn detergents and also as a solvent for printer ink.



Now I am going to introduce Singapore Aromatics Plant. This plant produce paraxylene which is used to make polyesters. It also produces Bezene whcih is use as a key basic chemical for manufacture of a wide range intermediate products, including cyclohexane that makes nylon. Nylon is used in everyday items such as stocking, rope and plastic toys.



The following is the Singapore Refinery (Fuel) by Exxon Mobil. It makes produces such as LPG, Naptha, Motor gasoline, Kerosene, Diesel and Heavy Fuel Oil Residual though distillation of crude oil.



The following image is the Jurong Aromatics Plant that produce products such as Cyclohexane, Orthoxylene and Touene. It produces aromatic products.



The following is the Singapore Refinery: Lubes and Specialties. It deal with lube basestocks, asphalt, paraffin waxes, solvents or something to deal with heavy feedstock. That column look like a vacuum distillation unit, it is very fat.