https://www.cas.cn/cm/202601/t20260106_5095307.shtml
In Ordos City, Inner Mongolia, a third-generation methanol-to-olefins (DMTO-Ⅲ) technology plant converts black coal into polyolefin products.
During the 14th Five-Year Plan period, this technology achieved key breakthroughs and large-scale application, with a single unit capacity exceeding one million tons, significantly reduced raw material consumption, five new licenses granted, and an additional 4 million tons/year of production capacity put into operation, further pushing the green transformation of “coal from fuel to raw material” from blueprint to reality.
The leap in production technology stem from the CAS Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics’ technological “long march” that began in the 1980s. At that time, the first step of methanol synthesis from coal was relatively mature, but the process from methanol to olefins remained a global challenge.
Through innovative molecular sieve synthesis methods, combined with innovations in catalyst preparation processes, a new generation of DMTO catalysts was developed, characterized by high olefin yield, low coke yield, wide operating window, and low trace impurities.
After the technological upgrade, one of the conversion sites was chosen in Ordos. This city shoulders the heavy responsibility of building a national important energy and strategic resource base; simply “mining and selling coal” cannot fully realize the true value of Inner Mongolia’s high-quality energy resources. “Ordos is a well-known coal city, with coal-bearing areas accounting for 70% of its total area, and its output is very stable. What it needs is to promote the transformation of its resources from ‘fuel-based’ to ‘raw material-based’ and its products from ‘general processing’ to ‘high-end manufacturing’,” said Ye Mao, a researcher at the Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics.
Baofeng Energy Company recognized these advantages and chose to partner with the Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics to establish a coal-to-olefins project here.
In 2025, the world’s largest single-plant coal-to-olefins project was fully operational, with all three units using DMTO-III technology, producing over 3 million tons of olefins annually.
