USA: Industrial Gases Praxair Starts Up Hydrogen Facility

Praxair has started up a hydrogen facility that will recover by-product streams from The Dow Chemical Company’s Freeport, Texas operations.

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Danbury/USA — Under a long-term contract, Praxair is supplying high-purity hydrogen back to Dow in order to meet the company’s needs across Southeast Texas. Additionally, the hydrogen will be used by Praxair to help supply increasing customer demand in the region.

The company has also signed a long-term contract with Dow to supply nitrogen to the company for use in its chemical production facility. The nitrogen supply is expected to start in 2019. Dow will use both gases to support the production of a number of specialty chemicals used in several diverse end markets, including automobile manufacturing, coating applications and chemical intermediates.

As part of the Freeport operation, Praxair is processing, recovering and compressing by-product hydrogen from Dow’s ethylene production facilities, which will include the company’s new world-scale ethylene cracker scheduled to come on line in 2017.

Both gases will be distributed through the French group’s U.S. Gulf Coast pipeline network to Dow’s Texas City and Freeport facilities. Praxair already had pipeline access to Texas City and recently extended its U.S. Gulf Coast pipeline systems approximately 46 miles to the Freeport area.

The company's hydrogen pipeline system is supported by multiple hydrogen plants as well as its 2.5 billion standard cubic foot hydrogen storage cavern, which uses patented technology. The cavern has been in commercial operation since 2007. The nitrogen pipeline system is built around multiple air separation facilities coupled with an extensive backup capability.

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