Current situation and development of gas industry in China

By the end of 1997, China has accumulated 8012 sets of air separation equipment designed and manufactured, the total capacity of oxygen generation has reached 2 million 60 thousand M3 / h, and the equipment technology level is also constantly improving. The mechanism of production enterprises has also undergone a great change. Global statistics, as of June 1998, China imported large and medium scale air separation equipment 141 sets, the total production capacity of 1 million 300 thousand M3 / 11. Especially, the 72000m3 / h air separation equipment imported from Baosteel has opened the door for the large-scale gas equipment in our country. According to incomplete statistics, the metallurgical industry only 6000m3 / 11 of the air separation equipment has nearly 100 sets. Advanced technology is continuously applied, such as regular packing tower, split sieve front air purification technology, the oxygen output load tracking regulation technology, design of hydrogenation of crown equipment manufacturing, pressure swing adsorption (PSA) technology with membrane separation (non cryogenic gas separation technology) etc.. In addition, new products of dissolving acetylene gas have been developed in recent years, such as petroleum welding and cutting gas and gasoline cutting welding machine. As China's gas industry is growing up under the planned economy system, there are still a series of problems due to the influence of "big and complete" and "small and complete".

(1) lack of macro management in the industry and serious duplication of construction. In the planned economy period, the development of domestic LNG equipment of gas cylinders let things drift, without control, all walks of life, the size of the enterprises who. In recent years, due to the production of gas equipment investment, stable profits, high returns, so there are a number of township enterprises and self-employed competing.

(2) lack of comprehensive utilization and serious waste of energy. The information shows that the small unit is 3 - 4 times the oxygen consumption of large units, small units of oxygen production of 1m3 than the big unit consumption of 1kW.h power, 1 150m3 / h units in more than 1 years on the about 1000000 kW.tt power consumption. At present, more than 90% of the air separation units in China are small units, and energy waste can be imagined.  With large air separation unit enterprise equipment utilization is low, the operation of the unit is mostly emptying. According to statistics, only metallurgical industry in the iron and steel enterprises oxygen venting rate reached 10%, 20%, venting oxygen 15 billion M: about 1 billion 500 million yuan loss. The losses caused by the annual venting of large units in China are even more distressing. And equipment utilization rate is low, most of the equipment at least 50% of the production capacity failed to play.

(3) the mode of production is backward and the layout is unreasonable. First of all, the domestic gas products packaging storage and transportation mode is the most high pressure cylinder filling storage, with the international advanced cryogenic vessel (or tank) compared to liquid gas storage capacity, small and not safe. Secondly, blindly launched a large number of air separation units, production layout is not reasonable.

(4) disorderly competition has caused great losses to the whole industry. Low price dumping leads to vicious competition, which leads to the increase of enterprise loss and the decline of industry benefit.

(5) foreign businessmen have entered China's market. At present, there are 8 multinational gas companies entering China's market successively, and their momentum has not decreased. By 2000, the total foreign investment will reach 1 billion US dollars, and its market share will be around 70%.

(6) at present, only 15000m3 / h equipment can be produced independently, and 30000m3 / 11 equipment depends on cooperative production, while large air separation equipment is still dependent on imports.

(7) the application field of gas should be expanded urgently.

Therefore, there is a huge gap between China's gas industry and the world's advanced level, and it should be developed in the direction of specialization, socialization, intensification, liquid, pipeline and integration:

(1) the establishment of the macro-control mechanism, prevent low-level redundant construction; change management method to let things drift, establish the examination and approval system, the number of small gas equipment production limited.

(2) establish self-discipline system, maintain normal market order and fair competition, and formulate corresponding supervision and inspection measures to gradually solve the chaotic situation of disorderly competition.

(3) the state should formulate appropriate policies to introduce foreign capital, and restrict the establishment of wholly foreign-owned or controlled gas companies to control the impact of foreign gas markets.

(4) actively promote regional integration, and gradually realize the social supply.  The joint production enterprises can not only effectively allocate the market share, but also prevent the repeated construction in the region. At the same time, it can also effectively eliminate the hidden dangers of the steel cylinder in the circulation field.

(5) reorganization of assets. Break the industry, regional or departmental restrictions, the market price law, adjustment of enterprise structure and industrial structure, the gas product as a link, to have a large gas unit enterprises or large professional factory as the main body, with a small unit for groups, the formation of large enterprise groups.

(6) gas equipment manufacturing enterprises jointly develop large air separation equipment, and joint development with gas production enterprises.

(7) develop new markets for gas supply and broaden the field of gas applications.

(8) extending liquid transportation mode and expanding pipeline transportation. Looking at the development process of the gas supply network and liquid in developed countries, combined with China's specific national conditions, liquid transportation is feasible in our country, but also the only way.