60 km South of the city of Doha, Qatar's capital, the Mesaieed site is not only one of the major Middle East petroeum harbors, it's also a very large industrial complex where Qapco (Qatar Petrochemical Co), gas, petroleum and other industries are located.

Qapco's ethylene production unit has a capacity of 525,000 tons/year due to the recent plant expansion (1994-1996) by Technip, the French engineering company (lumpsum turnkey contract).

This ethylene technology package called "TOPKIN" (by the Technip group Paris-Rome and KTI for the cracking area) includes a hot section including cracking furnaces and a cold section (progressive separation technology).

Thanks to the performances of the cryogenic turboexpander, and its associated cold box, the efficiency of the recovery section is excellent. An ethylene recovery ratio over 99.7% has been achieved. As a consequence, the ethylene loss in the fuel gas is limited to 0.1%, a lower figure than the expected 0.35%.

The main Rotoflow turboexpander (640 kW/ 21,000 rpm) is equipped with S2M magnetic bearings.

Besides the very high reliability of magnetic bearings, their decisive advantage for a low temperature process (-130°C / -150°C) is the total elimination of lubricant in the machine.

Any oil leak would instantaneously freeze, which would stop the process, clogging the cold box.

This global performance is praised by Qapco who highly recommends the use of S2M magnetic bearings for such applications.

In addition, one should mention that this technology is well suited for hot countries. It is extremely reliable with virtually no maintenance and no need to access parts overheated by high temperatures. It simplifies the operation of the machine.

"Thus, S2M magnetic bearings were an ideal technological choice for our project": Mr Gochtovtt, Project Manager Qapco Expansion (1992-1997).

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