With the approval of the Shanghai municipal
government, SRIPT was founded in May 1960 and is situated on the east
side of Huangpu River in the Pudong New Area of Shanghai. It was ever
one of the earliest research institutes engaged in the development of
China’s petrochemical-oriented technologies and now has become one of
the important research centers for advancing China’s petrochemical industry
as well as Sinopec Corp.’s petrochemical development and technology
innovation. Through the affiliations, established at SRIPT, for both
the National Engineering Research Center (NERC) for Basic Organic Raw
Materials (BORM) and the Petrochemical Branch of the National Chemical
Standardization Technical Committee in China, it has also participated
in some state strategic and engineering researches related to BORM,
as well as played an active role in preparing and revising both the
national and enterprise’s standardizations for BORM. To combine research
with training, the Postdoctoral Scientific and Research Working Station
at SRIPT was established a couple of years ago with the approval of
the Ministry of Personnel of the PRC.
Through the implementation of its own human resource strategy over
several decades, SRIPT has had a qualified research team that consists
of one member of Chinese Academy of Engineering and research professionals
with diversified professional backgrounds. In October 2005, among its
599 employees, SRIPT has 119 senior research fellows and senior engineers,
463 engineers and technicians. In addition, there are 37 research fellows
holding Ph.D. degrees and 84 holding master degrees. SRIPT is also very
proud of that the State Council awarded its 24 senior research fellows
the special governmental allowance in the past decades.
Following the Sinopec Corp.’s policy of the development of its proprietary
and innovative technology, SRIPT has long devoted itself to the R&D
and commercialization of the catalysts and processes for hydrogenation
of pyrolysis gasoline, hydropurification of terephthalic acid, ethylbenzene
dehydrogenation to styrene, acetoxylation of ethylene to vinyl acetate,
ammoxidation of propylene to acrylonitrile, catalytic distillation for
MTBE, vapor-phase alkylation of benzene to ethylbenzene, as well as
toluene disproportionation and transalkylation to xylenes. Moreover,
our other proprietary techniques derived from the above technologies
have also been commercially available: purification of crude acetonitrile,
preparation of cumene by liquid-phase alkylation, amination of methanol
to methylamines, oligomerization of propylene to nonene/dodecene, ammoxidation
of alkylaromatics to aromatic nitriles and either continuous or batch
preparation of low unsaturation polyether polyols with double metal
cyanide complex catalyst. In recent years, a portfolio of SRIPT’s self-developed
and commercially proven processes have been licensed to its customers,
for instance, using S-TDT toluene disproportionation and transalkylation
process licensed by SRIPT, a customer in the Middle East built a unit
with a capacity of 870KTA, which was commissioned in 2004. Besides,
the other overall processes, such as 130KTA S-ANT acrylonitrile process,
1000KTA S-TDT toluene disproportionation and transalkylation process,
200KTA S-SMT styrene process and 75KTA MTBE process etc., have also
been developed and put into use. In general, from the progresses made
in the above technologies, our customers at home and abroad have benefited
in terms of the reduction of energy & investment cost, efficient utilization
of feedstocks and environmental protection.
We know technology innovation sets us apart from our competition.
Since the end of 2003, we have started to join the 973 National Programme
on Key Basic Research Projects (the 973 Programme) to do “the Basic
Studies on the Synthesis of Porous Catalytic Materials with Novel Structure
and Excellent Performance,” through which our academic exchanges with
reputable colleges and research institutes in China and our academic
research capability have increasingly been enhanced. On the other hand,
till now, there are totally 783 patent applications filed and 460 granted
patents in which 13 pieces were granted by the intellectual property
offices located in 31 countries and regions around the world. Furthermore,
we won over 100 awards of the science and technology progress from provincial,
municipal and state administrations as well as Sinopec Corp., such as
one State First-Class Award for Science and Technology Progress, two
State Second-Class Awards for Science and Technology Progress, one State
First-Class Awards for Invention, eight Sinopec Corp. First-Class Awards
of Science and Technology Progress.
Now in order to consolidate and further boost our R&D strengths, we
have strategically planned the two R&D sites (one is the current research
site still situated in the Pudong New Area of Shanghai; the other the
chemical engineering & process development site in the Shanghai Chemical
Industry Park, which is under construction). Our goal is to build SRIPT
into an innovative & competitive research center for delivering more
benefits to our customers worldwide with our expertise and know-how.
