Tatarstan Academy of Sciences

Kazanorgsintez is ready to build two petrochemical facilities

Tatarstan is interested in a gas refinery construction project near Kazan. The project will provide new jobs and new tax payments. The second obvious advantage is an additional use of Kazanorgsintez capacities, which is nowadays the only ethane refiner in the country. As Realnoe Vremya learnt, the enterprise is ready to triple its ethane production capacities in case this project is implemented and provided that the capacities of an Orenburg gas refinery increase. It is noteworthy that given the specific of pyrolysis based on raw ethane processing, the environmental impact will rise insignificantly.

Tatarstan chemists beat about the bush

The idea of building a big gas refinery near Kazan came to Tatarstan chemists’ mind as early as before the 2000s. The project on the construction of a gas refinery is topical because a gas pipe is located literally 10 km far from Kazan, it has been pumping big volumes of natural gas from the Far North to the western border of Russia since the 80s.

“It is a mistake to sell gas with a big amount of ethane. There is a small component that gas is more calorific, but it needs to be refined into other materials,” says Rafinat Yarullin, director general of Tatneftekhiminvest-holding.

And Tatarstan was potentially interested in access to this feedstock. Local chemists considered the idea of the gas refinery as beating about the bush. They talked about it a lot, the issue was repeatedly raised, however, it never grew into a real project.

Serious prerequisites for the projects arose in late 2016 when an agreement was signed among Tatarstan, Gazprom, SIBUR, TAIF. As new pipelines were created in Nord Stream, old pipelines started to be used. At the same time, companies producing fat gas in the Far North (Gazprom, Novatek and others) were still interested in monetising it. An old pipeline could be used to transport fat gas from the Far North. And they could be refined with the emission of ethane and LFLH (large fraction of light hydrocarbons) and then processing into the final product could take place on an industrial site with ready-to-use infrastructure.

Promising Tatarstan

The gas refinery could potentially be built at any point throughout the pipeline in a suitable climatic zone from Novy Urengoy.

However, Tatarstan’s advantages, especially sites near Kazanorgsintez, are plain to see: there are developed infrastructure and powerful professional resources. Apart from the passing by pipeline, there is good transport logistics too here: M7 federal highway, a big railway hub and Sviyazhsk multi-modal logistic centre with access to sea routes. The Volga River is located relatively close, it provides water for production. Tatarstan itself — a traditionally chemical region — has big reserves of professional staff and a serious school to train this staff. Firstly, Kazan Federal University, Kazan National Research Technological University and the Lushnikov Kazan Chemical College annually turn out new qualified graduates. Secondly, some universities and colleges tuned up a long time ago to train specialists of related professions for chemical factories — energy workers, engineers and so on. And Kazan is more promising to attract staff than big Northern Ural or Siberian cities.

Read more on: Realnoe Vremya online newspaper