Danish catalysis provider Haldor Topsoe has won a contract to supply its methanol technology to Russia’s Gas Sintez.

The plant at the port of Vysotsk in the Leningrad region will produce 1.6 million t/y of AA-grade methanol based on Topsoe’s SynCOR technology and is expected to be completed in 2023.

Hyundai Engineering has already started developing the front end engineering design package and Russian engineering group NIIK has been awarded the general design contract.

In separate news, Topsoe has announced the recent official opening of the world’s only natural gas-to-gasoline complex in Turkmenistan. The complex includes the world’s largest methanol plant, which has a capacity of 1.72 million t/y and is based on autothermal reforming using Topsoe’s SynCOR technology.

In the complex, the SynCOR process has been combined with a gasoline synthesis loop to produce synthetic gasoline; the concept is known as SynCOR Tigas. Topsoe said during the past two years it has signed five license agreements of similar capacity based on SynCOR technology. These projects are in various stages of development.