AEC Online
Printable version Bookmark this page Notify a colleague or friend about this page Bookmark and Share

Uhde installs GEA Ecoflex plate heat exchangers in fertilizer plants for ammonia and urea production.

 
  Other News
  Subscribe to newsletter  
1 Sep 2008

The world's population is expanding rapidly. As are energy requirements. On the one hand satisfying the constant increase in demand for basic foodstuffs for almost seven billion people and on the other reducing the dependency on crude oil as a fossil fuel by using plant-based energy sources means that additional agricultural areas are needed. In addition, both soil quality and yield must be considerably increased.

And this can only be achieved by the targeted use of fertilizers. The production of nitrogen-based fertilizers is a chemically complex process where heat is repeatedly transferred between the process media. As the world's leading fertilizer plant engineering company, Uhde relies mainly on plate heat exchangers by GEA Ecoflex.

Helwan, 30 kilometres south of Cairo on the banks of the Nile, was once a spa resort with its sulphur springs. Nowadays Helwan is a centre of Egyptian heavy industry and since last year has another production field: Uhde GmbH with its headquarters in Dortmund has erected a large-scale fertilizer plant for the production of ammonia and urea granulate. This internationally structured company has been planning and building fertilizer plants throughout the world for over 80 years. And in recent times mainly in the Middle East.

Uhde installs GEA Ecoflex plate heat exchangers in fertilizer plants for ammonia and urea production.

In Egypt and Qatar, where huge reserves of natural gas as starting product for ammonia and urea production have caused a boom in plant engineering, Uhde has carried out the turnkey erection of six fertilizer plants in the past three years alone on behalf of a range of operator companies. These plants are already at their operational limits and are run at over 100% capacity.

To guarantee production reliability in the chemically highly complex manufacturing process needed for urea fertilizer, Uhde mainly uses PHEs by GEA Ecoflex. Gasketed plate heat exchangers are installed in the process chain for cooling in the CO2 and residual gas scrubbing and in other process sections as well as in the urea production plant.

"The exploding crude oil price has given our business a gigantic boost. The worldwide demand for biofuels is on the increase, and these are now in competition with foodstuff production. The areas used for plant-based fuel sources are growing continuously. And accordingly the demand for fertilizers is also increasing", says Reinhard Michel, Head of the Equipment Group in the Ammonia & Urea Division at Uhde GmbH.

In order to meet the demand for production plants the engineers at Uhde have been developing a copy concept whereby as many component designs as possible from previous plants can be used – a completely new approach. This reduces engineering costs enormously and minimizes construction time. From the initial project discussion until handover to the customer and start of production this takes only 36 months.

"We were particularly careful in selecting our partners and component suppliers for this copy concept", says Mr. Michel. As every change to a component would mean that the parts of the plant would have to be re-designed. And this would of course cancel out any cost savings. "GEA Ecoflex offers good prices, but even more decisive is the quality. Added to that there is the reliable after-sales service for our customers. If problems arise, our partner GEA is there to help with their know-how and cooperate with us to find a practical solution. And you can rely on that", says Mr. Michel.



Skyscraper Banners