New additives facility completed in China

Emerson Process Management and The Lubrizol Corporation have completed on-schedule, on-budget factory acceptance of Emerson’s integrated automation solution for Lubrizol’s greenfield additives manufacturing facility in Zhuhai, China. Emerson is the Main Automation Contractor for the plant, which will offer select additive component manufacturing as well as additive package blending.

Photo courtesy of Lubrizol

The Zhuhai plant is the cornerstone of Lubrizol’s 10-year investment plan to upgrade operations and increase global capacity in additives. Lubrizol will phase-in select capacity additions at the facility to meet market demand.

Emerson has collaborated with Lubrizol since the 2002 installation of a DeltaV™ digital automation system at a facility in Lanzhou, China. Since then, Lubrizol has expanded use of the DeltaV system into its largest base of production in Deer Park, Texas, USA, as well as other sites. The two companies have worked to further improve operational excellence at Lubrizol plants.

At Zhuhai, Emerson’s Main Automation Contractor role includes collaborating with the Lubrizol team to engineer, project-manage, install and commission a complete automation solution for the new additives plant. The Emerson solution is based on a front-end engineering and design (FEED) study done previously at Lubrizol’s facility in Deer Park, Texas.

Emerson’s DeltaV system will manage more than 2900 inputs and outputs, including Rosemount® measurement and analytical instruments, Micro Motion® Coriolis meters, Fisher® control valves and regulators, and on-off valves with FieldQ™ actuators – a total of almost 1900 Emerson measurement and control devices.

The system and devices are digitally integrated using IEC 62591 (WirelessHART®), FOUNDATION fieldbus, and Profibus communications. Emerson’s DeltaV Electronic Marshalling with CHARMs technology helps simplify engineering and installation by eliminating many of the wires and connections required by traditional marshalling.

"We are excited about joining Lubrizol in the successful digital integration and automation of the Zhuhai plant," commented Sabee Mitra, president of Emerson Process Management Asia Pacific. "The project combines our innovation in digital process automation with Lubrizol’s innovation in additives and technology. We are honoured to help them meet the region’s growing demand for their advanced products."