Total starts up new production line in South Korea

Seoul/South Korea – Total has started up its new polypropylene production line at its Daesan plant in South Korea, in which it owns a 50 per cent interest in partnership with Samsung. The new unit, with a capacity of 300,000 tons per year, will bring the total polypropylene capacity of the plant to 554,000 tons per year. A major expansion of the naphtha cracker has also been recently completed with the revamping of the associated downstream units. The expansion works have boosted the ethylene capacity of the cracker from 600,000 tons per year to 820,000 tons per year. In parallel, one styrene monomer unit has been expanded from 380,000 tons to 600,000 tons per year which included the conversion of the ethylbenzene section from gas to liquid phase, and incorporating energy-efficient multi-effect distillation in the purification section. The styrene production in the Daesan facility is currently 850,000 tons per year. The expansion works on the naphtha cracker and styrene unit were brought on-line as planned in early June.