Analysis on the Production and Market of Acrylonitrile

By Huang Jinxia, Ji Lichun and Lu Shulai, PetroChina Jilin Petrochemical Company


1. Production

In 2013, China’s total capacity to make acrylonitrile reached around 1.388 million t/a, and the total output reached around 1.2824 million tons. Major acrylonitrile producers in China in 2013 are listed in Table 1.
China’s new/planned acrylonitrile projects in the next few years are shown in Table 2. In early 2013, with the startup of Sinopec Anqing Petrochemical Co., Ltd.’s 130 kt/a new unit, China’s total capacity to make acrylonitrile reached 1.4 million t/a, and there will still be large new capacity for acrylonitrile in China in the next 3 years. According to the information from ChemSino, the 260 kt/a new unit of Shanghai Secco Petrochemical Co., Ltd. will be completed and put into operation by the end of 2014, and the total capacity to produce acrylonitrile of the company will reach 520 kt/a; Guangxi Keyuan New Materials Co., Ltd.’s 200 kt/a new unit (matching with its 400 kt/a ABS (acrylonitrile-butadiene-styrene) project) will be also put into production in 2014; the first phase 130 kt/a of 260 kt/a acrylonitrile project jointly built by Sinopec and China Wanda Group in Shandong Province is expected to start up in October 2014. In addition, on May 22 of 2013, INEOS Nitriles, the largest acrylonitrile producer in the world and Tianjin Bohai Chemical Industry Group Corporation signed a non binding Heads of Terms, setting out their intention to establish a 50/50 joint venture, to build and operate a 260 kt/a acrylonitrile plant to be located in Tianjin. It is expected that the plant, which will be designed using the latest INEOS process and catalyst technology, will be put into operation by the end of 2016. By 2016, therefore, China’s capacity for acrylonitrile will exceed 2.0 million t/a or even probably reach 2.3 million t/a, while the downstream demand will be slightly soft and is expected to be not more than 2.0 million tons, so China’s production of acrylonitrile will be fully able to meet the domestic demand.

2. Market trend

With the startup of new acrylonitrile downstream units like ABS/SAN resin and acrylic fiber units in succession in China, the demand for acrylonitrile will also enter a stage of rapid development. It is expected that China’s apparent consumption of acrylonitrile will reach around 2.3 million tons per annum by 2016. The proportion of acrylonitrile consumption in acrylic fiber production will fall gradually, while the proportion for the production of ABS/SAN will increase constantly.
In 2013, China’s apparent consumption of acrylonitrile was 1.83 million tons, being slightly more than that in 2012. China's consumption mix of acrylonitrile was around 48% for acrylic fiber, 28% for ABS/SAN, 14% for acrylamide, 5% for polyether polyols and around 5% for others including acrylonitrile-butadiene rubber. China’s supply and demand for acrylonitrile during 2008-2013 are listed in Table 3.
In general, China’s demand for acrylonitrile will be close to 2.0 million tons in 2014 and will increase at an average annual rate of 7%-8% in the next few years.
2.1 Price fluctuation
In 2013, domestic petrochemical enterprises faced different levels of difficulties including overcapacity, sluggish demand, rising cost and declining profit. As shown in Figure 1, in the first quarter of 2013, the domestic demand was passable, and the price of propylene was not relatively high, being around RMB10 000/t. The price of propylene fell afterwards, and the price decrease of acrylonitrile was more obvious due to the soft demand, resulting in the losses of most domestic acrylonitrile enterprises. In the third quarter, the price of propylene began to increase, but because of the slack downstream demand, the price of acrylonitrile was still at a low level. In the fourth quarter, the price of acrylonitrile began to rebound, however, the price of propylene also climbed, so the acrylonitrile enterprises were still in a state of losses. The price of acrylonitrile generally fell, mainly due to the year-on-year growth of acrylonitrile output in Sinopec in the first half, and the slack downstream demand.
2.2 Foreign trade
In 2013, the acrylonitrile downstream acrylic fiber and ABS market was slack, and the demand for acrylonitrile increased slightly compared with that in 2012. China’s import volume of acrylonitrile reached 547.6 kt, being slightly lower than that in 2012. Major import sources of acrylonitrile to China were Korea, Taiwan, the United States and Japan, altogether accounting for around 94% of the total volume imported.  See Figure 2 for detail.

Table 1   Major acrylonitrile producers in China, 2013 (kt/a, kt)

Producer    Capacity    Output    Location
PetroChina Jilin Petrochemical Company    420    304.6    Jilin, Jilin Province
Shanghai Secco Petrochemical Co., Ltd.    260    288.7    Shanghai
Sinopec?Anqing Petrochemical?Co., Ltd. Acrylic Fiber Plant    210    184.2    Anqing, Anhui Province
Sinopec Shanghai Petrochemical Co., Ltd.    130    128.4    Shanghai
PetroChina Fushun Petrochemical Co., Ltd.    90    76.8    Fushun, Liaoning Province
PetroChina Daqing Petrochemical Co., Ltd.     80    81.8    Daqing, Heilongjiang Province
PetroChina Daqing Refining & Chemical Co., Ltd.    80    80.6    Daqing, Heilongjiang Province
Sinopec Qilu Company    80    106.5    Zibo, Shandong Province
PetroChina Lanzhou Petrochemical Co., Ltd.    30    21.5    Lanzhou, Gansu Province
Shandong Qitai Petrochemical Co., Ltd.    8    9.3    Zibo, Shandong Province
Total    1 388    1 282.4    


Table 2   China’s new/planned acrylonitrile projects (kt/a)

Producer    Capacity    Remarks
Shanghai Secco Petrochemical Co., Ltd.    260    The project will be put into operation by the end of 2014
China BlueChemical Ltd.    200    Being located in Hainan Province and undetermined
China Wanda Group    260    The first phase 130 kt/a will start up in October 2014
Guangxi Keyuan?New Materials?Co., Ltd.    200    The project will be put into production in 2014
Shandong Keluer Chemicals Co., Ltd.    260    -
Bohai INEOS Chemical (Tianjin) Co., Ltd.    260    The project will be put into operation by 2016
Total    1 440    

Table 3  China’s supply and demand for acrylonitrile during 2008-2013 (kt, %)

Year    Output    Import
volume    Export
volume    Apparent consumption    Self-sufficiency
2008    942    285    6    1 221    76.6
2009    967    451    0.0    1 418    68.2
2010    1 090    446    0.0    1 536    68.9
2011    1 111.2    541.7    0.0    1 652.9    67.0
2012    1 158.2    555.4    0.0    1 713.6    67.6
2013    1 282.4    547.6    0.0    1 830.0    70.0


3. R&D and technical progress

At present, Sohio method developed by BP represents the world’s advanced production process. Over forty years of industrialization, Sohio method has matured, there are basically no big changes in process, and the research are mainly focused on the development of new catalysts, the process technical transformation that takes energy saving and consumption reduction as the goals, the improvement of process yield, the reduction of industrial wastes and the elimination of environmental pollution, etc. In addition, the price of propane is lower than that of propylene, so players have focused on the research of propane ammoxidation process for producing acrylonitrile. At present, the research and development of acrylonitrile production are mainly concentrated in the aspects such as the development of new catalysts, the process control as well as the improvement of post treatment process.
Beginning from 1990s, players both at home and abroad began to focus on the development of non ammonium sulfate acrylonitrile production process. There are several advantages for this new process. First, using this process, the complex ammonium sulfate recovery section is removed, greatly reducing the construction cost of acrylonitrile plant. Second, the process does not produce waste gases containing sulfur dioxide. Third, the heat of high-temperature waste gas generated in the wastewater incinerator can be recycled, and the problem for insufficient amount of steam generated in reactor can be completely solved. Fourth, it can obviously improve the refined recovery rate of acrylonitrile, and reduce the consumption of raw materials.

4. Suggestion

With the development of science and technology, acrylonitrile sector has presented several development trends. First, the acrylonitrile production route which uses propane as the raw material has been gradually promoted. Second, the development of new catalysts is still a hot topic for enterprises both at home and abroad. Third, the production units are becoming larger in scale. Fourth, energy saving, emission reduction, wastewater treatment and process optimization are becoming increasingly important.
According to the development trend of the acrylonitrile sector mentioned above, and the specific situation of domestic acrylonitrile units, the following suggestions are put forward for China’s acrylonitrile players:
(1) Relying on the scientific research strength of domestic research institutes, enterprises should actively explore the new technical route to produce acrylonitrile from propane, promote the development of catalysts, and form the technology with independent intellectual property rights.
(2) Enterprises should actively explore and develop the acrylonitrile production process that does not generate ammonium sulfate.                                                    ?