DMEA: Going in circles

In DMEA this week, we look at the certification of a circular methanol unit in Saudi Arabia and the news that Nigeria’s state oil firm’s project to rehabilitate its refineries is behind schedule.

Saudi Arabia’s National Methanol Co. (Ibn Sina) has received accreditation for circular methanol production by the International Sustainability and Carbon Certification (ISCC).

The facility, a joint venture between Saudi Arabia Basic Industries Corp. (SABIC), Celanese and Duke Energy, is able to deliver commercial quantities of certified circular methanol using as its feedstock CO2 captured by SABIC’s UNITED plant, one of the world’s largest CO2 capture and purification facilities.

SABIC said that the “production of circular methanol reflects SABIC’s efforts toward carbon emission reduction through low-carbon technology, operational efficiency, CO2 utilization, and innovative circular solutions”.

Ibn Sina, which is located in the Jubail Industrial City in Saudi Arabia’s oil-rich Eastern Province, stands to benefit from Saudi Arabia’s development of the ‘circular carbon economy’.

Meanwhile, Nigerian National Petroleum Corp. (NNPC) has said that its effort to rehabilitate Port Harcourt Refining Co. (PHRC) is running behind schedule.

The local Punch daily said it had viewed a report from NNPC stating that cumulative progress on the project should have amounted to 10.7% by this date. So far, though, the rehabilitation project is only 6.3% complete, and the government-owned company said in the report that it had ordered its contractor, the Italian company Tecnimont, to close the gap.

“[The] contractor is to issue a mitigation plan to address this variance and to ensure that the project is completed within schedule,” the report said, according to Punch.