In 1897, Lurgi was the cable address of Metallurgische Gesellschaft in Frankfurt, Germany. With the diversification of the company in 1919 due to new business in steam and adsorption and gathered expertise in the upgrading of solid fuels and the processing of the resulting gaseous and liquid product, the company divided into subsidiaries and adopted the legal trading name LURGI.

In France, on May 25^th, 1902, George Claude succeeded to develop a new air liquefaction process. It was then that two men: Georges Claude, the visionary and Paul Delorme, the pragmatic creator, constituted a public limited company, Air Liquide, on November 8, 1902, for the study and exploitation of Georges Claude’s Processes.

Based on fuel technology, Lurgi in the 30s engaged in Fischer-Tropsch synthesis - the founding stone for hydrocarbon technology and petrochemistry.

The first Fixed Bed Dry Bottom (FBDB) Gasification was started in Hirschfeld (Germany). The plant processed lignite feedstock.

At the end of the forties, the idea of physical absorption with methanol, which takes up all contaminants from raw synthesis gas streams, was born at Lurgi. After the construction of a pilot plant in Holten, Germany in 1949, the breakthrough for this process was achieved with a plant in Sasolburg, South Africa in 1953. Coal gas was purified to Fischer-Tropsch synthesis quality with this process.

The oldest town and synthesis gas production process is autothermal reforming. Based on this technology, Lurgi built the first plant in Mannheim, Germany for producing town gas from refinery gas.

In 1965, Adsorption processes of larger capacities were first used in Germany for drying and CO2 removal from air before entering the cryogenic units.

The development of the Air Liquide tonnage activity with the first Air Separation Units in France and Belgium with a capacity of more than 1000 tons per day of oxygen helped our clients to achieve greater efficiency for their industrial needs.

A new pumping process first used in a large plant in Fos-sur-Mer (France) revolutionized the Air Separation process, replacing the low pressure Gox external compression.

With the introduction of the Lurgi low-pressure methanol process as impressively proven by the successful start-up of three plants in Germany and Austria in 1973, a new era within the methanol technology started allowing to significantly reduce the production cost compared to the established high pressure process.

With an increasing demand for natural gas based syngas for the production of chemicals, Lurgi succeeded in developing a new concept for large-scale syngas production addressing the critical needs of the industry, i. e. economies of scale and reliability.

The first mega ASU project comprising 12 units each with a production capacity of 2 250 tons per day of oxygen was constructed in South Africa for a Coal-to-Liquids project. The project started with the first six units in 1979. Three years later, the company doubled the capacity of the plant by adding an additional six units.

Radial beds front-end purification was developed to purify very large flow rates in a single vessel required for large capacity plants of more than 2000 tons per day of oxygen. The technology was first used on a plant in South Africa and then in plants throughout Europe, the USA and China. Our radial beds front end purification today supports capacities of more than 5000 tons per day of oxygen.

A proprietary burner was developed and a first OxyClaus™ reference plant was installed in a refinery in Germany. This process allows Claus units to operate with pure oxygen instead of air (up to 80% of the total O2 demand), thus providing savings on the installed costs of new units and enabling increased capacity of existing ones.

The first plant comprising multiple natural gas treatment technological bricks (Acid Gas Removal, Sulfur Recovery Unit, Natural Gas Liquids extraction and separation) was designed and built by Lurgi in Kazakhstan. After successful execution, two additional trains were awarded to Lurgi by the same customer.

The creation of structured distillation packing for the Air Separation process allowed for drastically reduced pressure drops, which optimizes the power consumption.

The development of the first generation high air pressure scheme was used in plants in France, Italy, Spain, Argentina and Indonesia to optimize the process through the use of a single machine arrangement.

The first Cryogenic unit to purify Argon built in Martorell, Spain, was developed without the need for warm purification and H2 requirements.

The first Lurgi Steam Methane Reformer (SMR) using a cold collector design was developed and started up in 1994. The SMR is part of a fatty alcohol complex in Indonesia. Following the first successful implementation of the design, all following SMRs were designed on the cold header design principle. The SMR comprises 14 reformer tubes.

Air Separation Units with a capacity of 3 200 tons per day of oxygen were first developed and used on plants in Belgium, South Africa, China and Canada to provide increased performance.

The first Steam Methane Reformer (SMR) operating at 950°C 28 outlet temperature was started-up in Chuan Wei (Sichuan, China), yielding for high carbon monoxide (CO) production. The SMR has been built as part of a CO production

The development of an elevated pressure cycle provided increased process and energy efficiency and was first used on plants in Spain and Japan.

The Omnisulf™ technologies combines several proprietary key processes (BASF OASE®, Lurgi Purisol™ , Sulfur Recovery Unit, LTGT™, Aquisulf™…) tailored to specific needs and conditions for sweetening and processing of natural gas to pipeline or LNG specification, production of liquid elemental sulfur while minimizing Sulfur Dioxide (SO₂) emissions. The first plants were designed and started up in Qatar.

The development of the the first Air Separation Unit with a production capacity of 4 000 tons per day of oxygen was realized on a plant in South Africa.

Being committed to exploring new limits for syngas formation and the industry’s need to demonstrate technologies prior to their implementation, Lurgi, in cooperation with the local Technical University in Freiberg, Germany invested in a high pressure pilot plant testing to demonstrate syngas production at pressures above the industry standard.

With the introduction of the MegaMethanol® technology, Lurgi demonstrated once more its leading position in this industry by doubling the single train capacity, providing its clients with significant economies of scale. The first plant using this technology is based in Trinidad and Tobago.

Following the development phase in close coordination with R&D, including a pilot plant and demonstration plant operation, the first two references for Methanol-to-Propylene (MTP) technology were sold to Chinese customers. The plants were successfully commissioned in 2010 / 2011 thus proving the technology and serving as key references in the market.

In order to deliver solutions addressing the increasing need for sustainable energy solutions, conversion of (non-food related) bio-mass into fuels is key. Lurgi developed in cooperation with the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology in Germany an innovative process for the production of “renewable syngas”.

In 2007, the Air Liquide Group acquired the world renowned Lurgi Group, which joined forces with its Cryogenics engineering to form Air Liquide Global E&C Solutions.

The second generation high air pressure scheme was developed creating an even more flexible process of the single machine arrangement. The second generation high air pressure schedule was first used on a plant in Turkey and then on plants in Malaysia, Brazil, Italy and the United States.

Recognizing the enormous expertise in selective oxidation for our Lurgi petrochemical processes and the ability to leverage economies of scale, the world’s largest single train acrylic acid project in China, to produce 140,000 tons per year of acrylic acid, was awarded to Air Liquide GLobal E&C Solutions.

Highest biodiesel quality under most economical capital expenditure (CAPEX) and operational expenditure (OPEX) conditions was achieved by introducing a new unit. With this important step, the flexibility in feedstock selection increased. Widely available feedstock’s like palm- or soy bean oils can now be converted to biodiesel at the highest standards without needing costly (post) treatment.

Following the strong development, marketing and engineering effort to commercialize the Methanol to Propylene technology, the third MTP license was sold to a customer in Ningxia, China in 2011, demonstrating the acceptance of this new technology by the market.

Focused on the significance of the Coal-to-Chemicals market in China, Air Liquide Global E&C Solutions underpinned its leading position by designing the world’s largest Rectisol unit in Ningxia, China, leveraging the efforts of a comprehensive improvement program dedicated to this well-proven technology.

The largest single packaged cold box construction with a production capacity of 3 700 tons per day of oxygen in Korea was awarded to Air Liquide Global E&C Solutions.

By successfully reducing the operating pressure of the fixed bed Fatty Alcohol process, massive savings in equipment costs were achieved. Together with a new reactor concept designed for extended operation periods, and a highly efficient catalyst utilization, Air Liquide Global E&C Solutions is able to offer one of the most advanced and competitive technologies to the market.

The largest helium liquefier (20 tons per day net production) was designed, manufactured and installed in Qatar by Air Liquide Global E&C Solutions between 2011 and 2013, including gas treatment from a feed of about 50 % helium up to 100 % liquid helium.

About 350 kilo normal cubic meters per hour (kNm³/h) hydrogen (300 kNm³/h hydrogen produced by two Steam Methane Reformers + 45 kNm³/h hydrogen produced by a Pressure Swing Adsorption processing off-gas, the largest ever “over the fence” production site for a single customer was commissioned in 2014.

Integrating the gasification of liquid residues into a refinery balances the hydrogen demand of hydro-processing units. The first commercial-scale MPG reference is currently underway by Air Liquide Global E&C Solutions. The project is a bitumen gasification and is a first large-scale application of the Multi Purpose Gasification (MPG) technology. It will be the first bitumen based Partial Oxidation (POx) plant for Air Liquide in Canada as part of a full technology package, also including, for example, the Rectisol unit.

Cryocap™ is a technological innovation for Carbon Dioxide (CO₂) capture that is unique in the world, using a cryogenic process (involving low temperatures to separate gases) and can be adapted to specific applications such as for the capture of CO₂ produced by steel plants (Cryocap™ Steel), thermal power station (Cryocap™ Oxy), and hydrogen production units (Cryocap™ H₂). Its installation in Port-Jérôme, Normandy, at the largest steam methane reforming hydrogen production unit operated by Air Liquide in France represents the first industrial deployment of the Cryocap™ H₂ technology

Air Liquide invested € 200 million for the construction of the largest Air Separation Unit (ASU) ever built, with total capacity of 5,000 tons per day of oxygen (equivalent to 5,800 tons per day at sea level), a milestone in the history of industrial gas production. The plant is located in Secunda, South Africa.