Uhde to supply EDC plant with new reactor process

Uhde has been awarded a contract by Limburgse Vinyl Maatschappij for a new ethylene dichloride (EDC) plant in Tessenderlo, Belgium. The facility will produce 250 000 tonne/year using the innovative Vinnolit-Uhde boiling reactor technology.

Uhde’s scope of work includes the licence, basic and detailed engineering, procurement, construction management and supervision of the commissioning activities. This will be the first industrial application of the technology that creates EDC from the direct chlorination of ethylene. In the new boiling reactor liquid-phase ethylene reacts catalytically with chlorine.

The chlorine for the new plant will be produced at a membrane electrolysis plant currently being built by Uhde at the same location for Tessenderlo Chemie.

The EDC produced is of such high quality that distillative purification is no longer necessary and it can be used immediately as feedstock for the production of vinyl chloride (VCM) or offered for sale. VCM will be manufactured as an intermediate from the EDC produced at the plant and this in turn will be used to manufacture PVC.