ORLEN Unipetrol, the leading Czech producer of refinery, petrochemical and agrochemical products, will implement the Pörner Bitumen Packing System at its Litvinov refinery. The pioneering logistics and supply chain solution for cold bitumen will allow bitumen production to be extended into the winter months and thus overcoming seasonality.
Vienna-based bitumen specialist Pörner Ingenieurgesellschaft mbH was awarded the contract to supply the system. The process engineering company is the world market leader in bitumen oxidation with its Biturox® process for bitumen production. The project, which started in January 2024, is scheduled to be completed in August 2025. It covers engineering and supply of the Pörner Bitumen Packing System including a 20 ton per hour Cooling & Packing Unit (CPU) and an associated Bitumen Melting Unit.
This project in Litvinov is the first cooperation with Orlen Unipetrol, following previous joint projects such as the general planning of a Biturox® production plant in 1997 and a Biturox® pilot plant for the development of high-quality bitumen grades in 2021 across Orlen´s Group of companies.
The Pörner Bitumen Cold Logistics
The Pörner Bitumen Packing System, invented by Pörner and continuously developed since 2006, enables sustainable storage and ecological transport of bitumen for road construction in cold condition.
"With our cold bitumen logistics, any construction site in the world, no matter how difficult to reach, can be supplied with conventional means of transportation - and with a significantly reduced CO2 footprint. The system replaces expensive, energy-inefficient and environmentally harmful logistics with 200-liter metal drums and liquid transport with heated ships," explains Pörner Managing Director Andreas Pörner. “The cooling and melting technologies applied are based on Pörner's expertise gained from constructing more than 60 bitumen production plants worldwide."
Concept and Technology
The integrated PÖRNER BITUMEN PACKING SYSTEM consists of three elements:
1. Cooling & Packing: In the Cooling & Packing Unit (CPU) the bitumen is cooled from a high storage temperature (approx. 180°C) to 108°C and filled into the Pörner Bitumen Bags™. This requires special process control as the viscosity of the bitumen rises significantly during cooling and once cooled, the bitumen cannot simply be returned to hotter storage tanks. This allows small batches to be filled on demand. Filling is electronically controlled and monitored for quality assurance and billing purposes.
2. Pörner Bitumen Bags™: These stabilized flexible containers are optimized for filling at a defined product temperature and allow maximum loading of standard oversea containers and road vehicles. The bags consist of a load-bearing outer bag made of polypropylene fabric and an inner bottle-shaped liner made of polyethylene film, which withstands the filling temperature and can be melted together with the product. The dimensions of the different types of Pörner Bitumen Bags™ are adapted to common means of transportation such as trucks, trains and containers. In 2023, Andreas Pörner developed and patented the Bag 2T, which can now hold more than two tons of bitumen for optimal single-layer loading of shipping containers. This new container is particularly safe and stable - and very economical thanks to its larger size.
3. The Pörner High Performance Melter™: The Pörner High Performance Melter efficiently melts cold bitumen on site using a patented heating grate with heat recovery. Up to 50 percent of heating energy is saved compared to conventional drum melting systems. Bag storage eliminates the need for expensive, continuously heated tanks. The modular HP Melter can be quickly relocated to the next site where it is needed.
Economical and efficient
Pörner Bitumen Cold Logistics does not require any special infrastructure along the supply chain such as special heatable tankers, large heatable storage tanks (in harbors), jetties, special heatable bitumen tankers or local supply tank farms.
This has the effect of significantly reducing the CO2 footprint, especially in case of prolonged storage in local depots. Delivery in a hot liquid state is often impossible under difficult logistical conditions.
"Another strength of Pörner Bitumen Cold Logistics is the security of supply, especially in case of sudden bottlenecks in the conventional bitumen supply. The actual seasonal consumption of a road construction company can never be accurately predicted, as road construction is a project business.” says Pörner project manager Christian Opitz.
Unipetrol project manager Igor Meluš adds: “Thanks to the Pörner Bitumen Packing System, we will be in a position to prolong our bitumen production season and to offer bitumen flexibly."
