Air Products Builds a World-Scale Carbon Monoxide Coldbox in China for Yangzi Petrochemical

01-15-2009: Air Products has completed the manufacturing of a world-scale carbon monoxide (CO) coldbox at its cryogenic equipment manufacturing facility in Caojing, Shanghai for Yangzi Petrochemical Corporation, a subsidiary of Sinopec Corporation. According to the company, it is the largest CO coldbox and the largest workshop-built CO coldbox that Air Products has ever constructed for its customers globally. A completion ceremony was held at the Caojing Manufacturing Facility.

Weighing over 300 tons and measuring over 70,000 cubic feet, the CO coldbox for Yangzi Petrochemical was designed with Air Products cryogenic technologies. It was completely manufactured at the Caojing Manufacturing Facility in Shanghai, one of Air Products’ three global manufacturing centers to build various types of industrial gas separation equipment. Building coldboxes in the workshop increases safety, reliability, and quality of the manufacturing process, and hence the equipment quality.

The coldbox will produce over 300,000 tons per year of CO and will be used in the 500,000 ton per year acetic acid factory of Yangzi Petrochemical. In addition to CO, the coldbox will produce hydrogen and syngas, a mix of carbon monoxide and hydrogen, to produce methanol, fuel, acetic acid and other products.

Air Products will ship the CO coldbox via the Yangtze River and work with Yangzi Petrochemical for the road transportation to deliver the coldbox to its facility at the Nanjing Petrochemical Complex in Jiangsu Province, a journey totaling over 150 miles from Shanghai. Air Products will supervise the installation of the CO coldbox at the Nanjing site.