Refinery catalysts are predominantly used in petroleum refineries to alter the rate of chemical reactions and enhance the quality of gasoline products produced through processes such as FCC and hydro-processing. Petroleum refineries extensively use refinery catalysts to enhance the operational efficiency of valuable hydrocarbons. Additionally, they also minimize the adverse effects of products such as gasoline and diesel on the environment by assisting in the removal of sulfur from crude oil. In petroleum refineries, they are used in hydrocracking, hydrotreating, fluid catalytic cracking, and alkylation processes. The procurement market intelligence report on refinery catalysts market states that the market growth will be driven by demand for ultra-low sulfur diesel. This is because governments across the world are prompting refineries to limit sulfur content to 0.5% by 2020 in fuels.
Challenges in the Refinery Catalysts Market
Costly E&P Activities
E&P activities for crude oil are costly as it requires the use of advanced technologies for conducting essential processes such as wireline logging, seismic mapping and survey, and drilling (vertical or horizontal). Because of this E&P companies are operating at a razor-thin margins and are operating in a highly unstable financial environment. The increasing cost of E&P activities is affecting the production capacity of the refineries, which is posing a challenge to the global refinery catalyst market.
Adoption of Renewable Sources of Energy
Today, the whole world is moving towards renewable sources of energy. Governments are investing heavily in hydro, wind, and solar energy sources to decrease their dependence on fossil fuels. The most significant oil producers in the Middle East are also investing heavily in solar energy. Additionally, the emergence of electric car companies like Tesla has urged the governments to prioritize electric vehicle over gasoline. The growing importance of renewable sources of energy is thereby limiting the growth of the global refinery catalysts market.
Rising Cost of Rare Earth Elements
Oxides of rare earth elements are quintessential in the refinery process as zeolite cracking catalysts lack hydrothermal stability during the FCC process. The use of zeolites with rare earth elements provides hydrothermal stability and tends to enhance gasoline yield. However, such rare earth elements are sparsely available, and their costs are ever-increasing. The rising costs of rare earth elements have limited the growth of the global refinery catalyst market.
Read more about the challenges in the refinery catalysts market along with specialty chemicals, oil refinery process, sourcing strategies, pricing models, logistics and supply chain issues, and procurement best practices in SpendEdge’s upcoming report on the global refinery catalysts market.
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