ERG wins Euro1m contract in Qatar

Horsham, UK - ERG’s APC Process Engineering division won a Euro1-million contract to supply two gas conditioning plants for the QAFCO5 project in Qatar. Lead contractor Italian-based Saipem awarded the contract for the equipment, which will be used on a fertiliser plant expansion. 

QAFCO (the Qatar Fertiliser Company) operate the world’s largest ammonia and urea production site at Mesaieed City, Qatar. The QAFCO 5 project is a $3.2 billion investment and the new capacity is scheduled to come on stream in 2011.

ERG has previously supplied gas conditioning plants to the QAFCO facility, starting with units for the QAFCO 1 project in 1973 and continued through each expansion phase to QAFCO 4 in 2005.

Each of the QAFCO plants uses high pressure natural gas from offshore as the principal raw material for the ammonia and urea production. However the natural gas contains H2S which corrodes the pipework and forms scale in the gas stream. This scale, together with any entrained particulates, must be removed from the gas stream prior to downstream processing.

To accomplish this critical gas cleaning, ERG is supplying two specially designed high-pressure venturi scrubbers to remove >99.5% of particulates. The QAFCO 5 scrubbers will be constructed from 25mm thick 316L stainless steel and each system will be capable of conditioning 90,000Nm3/hr of gas.