The Ma’aden Wa’ad Al Shamal Phosphate Company (MWSPC) has signed a service agreement for a period of three years with DuPont Clean Technologies (DuPont) for its sulfuric acid plant in Sirhan, in the Turaif region in Saudi Arabia
The service programme will include activity testing of catalyst samples, evaluation of catalyst performance, plant optimization, troubleshooting and management of catalyst replacement.
Furthermore, DuPont will track performance and assess the overall health of the plant using pre-agreed metrics and will employ its proprietary portable MECS PeGASyS gas chromatography system to assist MWSPC with troubleshooting and plant performance optimisation.
The MWSPC operation is a joint venture between Ma’aden, SABIC and the USA company Mosaic. It manages a phosphate complex with mining, beneficiation, phosphoric acid and sulfuric acid operations with a total capacity of 16 million tonnes per year and a fertiliser facility with a capacity of 4.3 million tonnes per year.
Thierry Marin, managing director, DuPont Clean Technologies, EMEA said, “Through years of acid plant ownership and operating experience, DuPont has achieved operational and reliability excellence that is considered best in class by the industry. That performance is based on best practices we have developed and applied to our own operations and to those of customers.”
DuPont will be employing its proprietary portable PeGASyS gas chromatography system to analyse the SO2 and O2 converter gas streams at the MWSPC site to provide a solid basis for the planning of turnarounds.
The system is not only suitable for gas analysis, but also can be used to detect possible leaks in gas-to-gas heat exchangers, identify SO2 gas bypassing and measure overall plant conversion in order to optimise plant operation, reduce SO2 emissions, increase production and improve converter performance.
