Competitive Edge: Infra XTL Technology Ltd.

Q: What was the reason for founding your organization – what was the open niche you saw that could be addressed with a new product or service? What was the problem, or gap, or opportunity?

Infra started 10 years ago with the goal to build a Fischer-Tropsch (FT) catalyst that will produce no waxes. This was important to reduce the amount of Capex needed to build our small-scale GTL plants to provide clean fuels and reduce associated gas flaring.

We define small scale as 500 – 5000 BPD of production. This would consume 5.0 – 50.0 MMscfd of natural gas that is currently flared or vented as a result of oil production.

In a normal FT reaction, waxes can make up to 50% of the liquid product produced. By eliminating the wax content, and producing a single stream, stable liquid product, there is no need to spend money on hydro-cracking of the wax to create more product yield. The synthetic crude oil we produce is immediately useable as a blend stock or can be upgraded to drop-in diesel.

Q: Tell us about your organization. What do you do?

Infra started 10 years ago with the goal to build a Fischer-Tropsch (FT) catalyst that will produce no waxes. This was achieved and is currently running in a full scale pilot plant (about 15 liters/day) with no degradation seen after 6 months continuous operation. We built a 100 BPD demonstration facility in Wharton, TX (near Houston) and are in the process of startup. Infra specialize in small-scale GTL plants (500 – 5000 BPD) and are currently looking at project opportunities on a global scale.

Q: What stage of development are you?  Choose one:

Demonstration stage – proven at small, integrated scale, but not yet commercially available.

Q: What do your technologies, products or services do and accomplish – how does it (they) work, who is it (they) aimed for?

Infra is a FT catalyst and FT reactor specialist. We are syngas agnostic and will accept syngas at a 2.2:1.0 ratio from any source. Our current GTL plant designs use a SMR reformer as the front end due to the reduced emissions that can be achieved with this technology. We have completed FEED studies with ATR and POx reformers systems as well.

Our key technology is our FT catalyst that produces no wax during production. We have built our own catalyst factory and pilot / demonstration facilities. The reason for not producing waxes is to enable blending or transport of our single liquid, stable synthetic crude oil at site, without the need to further refining.

As a company we are completing design of a modular 500 BPD FT module that can be bolted onto any syngas source. These can be chained to deliver up to 3000 BPD of product from ~35 MMscfd of natural gas.

Q: Competitively, what gives your technology, product or service set an edge in cost or performance, sustainability, or any other aspect, that makes it stand out from the crowd, In short, what makes it transformative?

Our technology is differentiated in two key areas:

1. Our catalyst that produces no waxes. Not producing waxes that need additional refining after production is a huge cost savings over other FT products.

2. Our FT reactor design which we believe is the lowest cost, least complex system available in the world.

We hold over 40 patents in multiple jurisdictions. Our FT reactor module design is based on prior working systems for heat removal and in design.

We are working to move the cost of GTL plants from a historical $200,000/bbl/day down to <$80,000/bbl/day. This goal can only be achieved with a front end reformer technology that is about 1/2 the price and 1/2 the footprint of current systems. We believe we already have the lowest price and smallest modular footprint for any FT module in a GTL plant.

Q: What are some of the top milestones you have accomplished in the past 3 years?

1. Completed pilot facility and long term testing of our final go to market catalyst product that produces a single liquid stream of API 59 synthetic crude oil, with 65% diesel fraction and 35% naphtha fraction, NO WAXES.

2. Competed construction and partial start up of our 100 BPD demonstration plant located in Wharton, TX (near Houston). Obtained syngas and amine section production, but did not reduce syngas to the correct ratio to start the FT section.

3. Created partnerships with reformer suppliers and EPC companies to allow Infra to focus on catalyst perfection and license opportunities. Trying not to be everything to all clients, but focusing on what we are capable of and can deliver, has been key to developing the pipeline of projects we currently enjoy.

Q: What are some of the top milestones you will accomplish in the next 3 years?

1. Start up and full demonstration of the Wharton M100 GTL demonstration plant.

2. Delivery of first 500 BPD GTL plants with multiple clients.

3. Delivery of 3000 BPD GTL plants with multiple clients.

Q. Where can I learn more about Infra XTL Technology?

Click here to visit Infra XTL Technology’s website.