[Quotation]
State refinery operator Kuwait National Petroleum Company (KNPC) is turning to innovative technology as an alternative to its planned Al-Zour refinery. Despite the company doubling the budget for its refinery in early May, the project could still prove uneconomical.
KNPC has signed a memorandum of understanding with Japan’s Xenesys to look into the development of discharged thermal energy conversion technology at its Kuwait facilities. If implemented, it will be the first time innovative waste-heat technology has been used in the Gulf.
The state has major environmental issues because of its oil-burning power plants. The 615,000-barrel-a-day refinery at Al-Zour planned by KNPC is intended to provide clean fuel for power generation. However, rising development costs have forced KNPC to look at other technologies.
Discharged thermal energy conversion technology uses the heat generated from the cooling processes at power and oil installations to create electricity.
It is a modification of ocean thermal energy conversion technology, which is based on the temperature differences between deep and shallow seawater. Instead of seawater, discharged thermal energy conversion, which has been pioneered by Xenesys, uses the wasted heat and warm effluent wastewater to evaporate ammonia, the vapours of which can power turbines to generate electricity at very little cost and without pollution. The ammonia gas is then cooled using cold deep seawater to allow the ammonia to be reused.
KNPC has also been looking at using integrated gasification combined cycle technology as a substitute for the new refinery project.
Oil Minister Shaikh Ali al-Jarrah al-Sabah said on 8 May that KNPC had revised its budget estimates for the Al-Zour refinery to $12,000 million, up from the original budget of $6,300 million.
However, with the original prices coming in at more than $15,000 million, the retender could still end up above budget. If this happens, KNPC says it will abandon the project entirely and look at other options (MEED 4:5:07).