Technology

^History

Innovene S technology was first developed by Solvay in the 1960s, and offered for license by INEOS from 2005.  Innovene has been for years the name of BP's polyethylene technology^[1,2]. 

By Dec 2005, INEOS announced to have completed the purchase of BP's Innovene business for $9bn, said to fit well with the INEOS strategy to create a petrochemical company. Only ten months later, INEOS decided to drop the Innovene name, rebranding the business activities into Ineos Refining, Ineos Olefins, Ineos Polyolefins, Ineos Olefins & Polymers USA, Ineos Nitriles, Ineos Technologies, and Ineos Oligomers^[3].

By June 2015, INEOS claims to have 7,5 million tonnes annually licensed in 9 years, 7 Ineos slurry lines and licensees for a total of 2.1 million tonnes and 16 lines in design or construction stage for a total of more than 6 million tonnes^[4].  

Meanwhile, Ineos Technologies has stopped licensing activities.  

Process Description

The Innovene™ S process utilises proprietary vertical slurry loop reactors in a two reactor system providing easy and efficient transitions between bimodal and monomodal product operations. Simplified degassing, no centrifuges and a robust low energy diluent recycle combine to provide outstanding campaign­-to­-campaign stability with minimal wide­-specification product and no wax or oligomers generation^[1,4].

The process features are claimed to be^[4]: 

• Routine swing monomodal/bimodal/Cr-catalyst operations
• Quick transitions
• No wax generation
• Low Capex & Opex

Products

Innovene™ S technology is suitable for the production of a range of LLDPE and HDPE products, such as C₄-LLDPE, mLLDPE, mHDPE, Cr-HDPE, and Bimodal HDPE going into a variety of applications such as film, blow molding, injection molding, pipe & conduits, textile, W&C, geomembranes and rotomolding^[4].

References

1. BUSINESS MAGAZINE FOR INTERNATIONAL ENTERPRISES, xx edition 2015, In demand PE Technologies, Ineos Technologies.
2. CHEMICAL & ENGINEERING NEWS, 30^th Jan 2006, Ineos changing Innovene name.
3. INEOS, Press Releases, 16th Dec 2005, INEOS completes purchase of BP's Innovene business for $9bn.
4. Dr. Fabian Siberdt, Jun 2015, Innovene™ G & S technologies: Recent advances and global positioning, PEPP 2015, Zürich.