Ascend chooses UOP's C3 Oleflex for $1.2-billion Chocolate Bayou PDH project

Honeywell subsidiary UOP (Des Plaines, IL) on Thursday announced that Ascend Performance Materials (Houston, TX) has selected the C3 Oleflex process technology for a $1.2-billion propane dehydrogenation (PDH) facility planned for its Chocolate Bayou complex in Alvin, TX.  

Ascend expects to begin construction in January 2014 and to bring the plant on line in the fourth quarter of 2015. According to UOP, it will be the world’s largest on-purpose propylene facility, with a production capacity greater than 1 million m.t./year. In addition to technology, UOP will supply engineering design, catalysts, adsorbents and selected equipment for the project, the company said.

UOP said it has announced 14 Oleflex projects since the beginning of 2011. The Ascend project will be the seventh in North America since the technology was first commercialized in 1990.

"Global propylene demand is growing at about 4-5% per year," said Pete Piotrowski, senior vice president and general manager of Honeywell's UOP Process Technology and Equipment business unit. “The U.S. is seeing an increase in on-purpose propylene production because of the abundance of low-cost propane from shale gas. "Compared with competing propane dehydrogenation processes, UOP Oleflex technology provides the lowest cash cost of production, the highest return on investment and the smallest environmental footprint."