Air Products, headquartered in Lehigh Valley, Pa., announced last week a definitive agreement for a long-term on-site contract enabling the conversion of natural resources into higher-value products in Indonesia.
The contract will fund a world-scale coal-to-methanol facility in Bengalon, East Kalimantan, Indonesia. The facility will enable nearly 2 million tons per year of methanol to be produced from nearly 6 million tons per year of coal.
“As Southeast Asia’s largest economy, Indonesia is committed to reduce its energy imports and efficiently convert abundant coal resources into high-value products,” Sefi Ghasemi, chairman, president and CEO of Air Products, said. “We are proud to have been awarded another world-scale gasification project, where we will deploy our capital, technology and operational expertise to help Indonesia meet these important goals. This is another example of our long-term strategy to deploy capital into high-return strategic industrial gas projects.”
Under the contract, PT. Bakrie Capital Indonesia and PT. Ithaca Resources will supply the coal feedstock and have committed to offtake the methanol production for sale within Indonesia. Air Products will invest approximately $2 billion to build, own, and operate the air separation, gasification, syngas clean-up, utilities and methanol production assets to produce methanol for Bakrie and Ithaca.
The project is expected onstream in 2024.
Samir Serhan, Air Products’ executive vice president, added, “Our core competency is our ability to develop, execute, own and operate complex process facilities that help our customers create engines of economic growth and social development. We look forward to supporting Bakrie and Ithaca in this game-changing megaproject that will provide methanol for domestic consumption to support Indonesia’s sustainable economic growth.”
In addition to its endeavor in Indonesia, Air Products is also executing several gasification projects in China and Saudi Arabia.