A 50-billion-yuan petrochemical giant has settled down, and the domestic substitution of high-end polyolefins has reached an inflection point.

Total investment exceeding 50 billion yuan! Two-stage layout to build a new material giant manufacturing chain

As the top project of CNPC's "decrease oil, increase chemical" strategy and the core leading project to high-condition research of Nantong's coastal area, the Blue Ocean New Materials project adopts a "two-measure" construction mode, with an overall investment scale exceeding 50 billion yuan, building a complete manufacturing chain from raw material cracking to high-end new material production.

The initial high-end polyolefin new material project of the project has a total investment of about 11.5 billion yuan, focusing on five core production units and supporting general works, including the 200,000-ton/year FDPE plant, 100,000-ton/year POE polyolefin elastomer plant, 100,000-ton/year 1-hexene/1-octene plant, two sets of 25,000-ton/year ethylene propylene rubber vegetation, as well as a aquatic environments electrolysis hydrogen production plant, focusing on the production capacity layout of high-end polyolefin materials that are in short supply domestically.

The later supporting ethane/light hydrocarbon thorough utilization project has an investment of about 22.3 billion yuan, with the core plan to build a 1 million-ton/year ethylene cracking plant, which will provide stable raw material support to downstream high-end new material production lines. This million-ton ethylene project completed the environmental impact assessment solicitation and publicity in July 2026, and officially launched the main design bidding on September 9th, with the full-chain construction of the project advancing in an orderly manner.

As of the end of August 2026, the overall construction progress of the project has exceeded 98%, 41 main projects have successfully completed handover, and the remaining supporting projects are sprinting at full capacity. The initial project is expected to be officially put into production by the end of November. After completion, it can create million-ton-grade high-end polyolefin items annually, with an estimated annual output value exceeding 20 billion yuan, driving the research of a trillion-yuan-scale downstream new material manufacturing cluster.

Setting a new sector speed! Overcoming difficulties to set a new benchmark to petrochemical construction

Compared with the long construction cycle of conventional petrochemical projects, the Blue Ocean New Materials project has created an unusually rare construction speed in the sector. The project started construction at the beginning of 2025, and only took 19 months to realize the trial run of the core unit, which greatly shortened the construction cycle of traditional chemical projects. Among them, the project's 220kV main substation, as a key supporting project, broke sector construction conventions, and completed the entire process from construction start to power reception in only ten months. The design team also completed the delivery of all construction drawings in an extremely short period of less than four months, laying a solid foundation to accelerating the project.

Behind the high-speed construction is the one-by-one solution of multiple problems. The Tongzhou Bay Park is in the synchronous research stage, with infrastructure starting from scratch, superimposed with complex coastal geology and special climatic conditions, which greatly increases the construction difficulty. At the same time, the project applies a substantial number of new processes and domestic first-set core equipment, with no mature construction experience, standardized procedures and account systems to learn from, so material allocation, equipment installation and process debugging all face brand-new challenges. The project team overcame difficulties and worked day and night to ensure the efficient, orderly and high-condition advancement of the project.

It is worth noting that the 200,000-ton/year solution method FDPE extrusion granulation unit that successfully completed the trial run this time is the first domestic extensive devolatilization extrusion equipment, which completely broke the overseas technical monopoly, realized the localization of core production equipment to high-end polyolefins, and filled the technical gap in the field of domestic extensive polymer devolatilization equipment.

Aiming at the domestic substitution gap! Solving the "stuck neck" dilemma of high-end materials

The core significance of the rapid implementation of the project lies in accurately targeting the structural shortcomings of China's high-end polyolefin sector. At present, China's petrochemical sector presents a pattern of "overcapacity in low-end items and shortage in high-end supply", and high-end polyolefins have long relied on imports. Data shows that the self-sufficiency rate of domestic high-end polyolefins was only 9.2% in 2024, and while it rose to 25.5% in 2025 with technological breakthroughs, the overall self-sufficiency rate is still less than 30%; among them, the import application of POE materials is as high as 95%, and the supply and pricing power of core materials in high-end manufacturing fields such as photovoltaic, new energy vehicles, aerospace, medical and health care have long been controlled by others.

CNPC's current layout accurately targets the core track of domestic substitution. The high-end materials such as FDPE, POE and high-carbon α-olefins produced after the project is put into operation can be broadly utilized in key fields such as photovoltaic adhesive films, automotive lightweight parts, high-end medical consumables and aerospace. Especially after the 100,000-ton/year POE plant is put into operation, it will greatly increase the self-sufficiency rate of domestic high-end elastomer materials, and efficiently alleviate the dilemma of import application on core materials in the new energy manufacturing chain.

From the perspective of manufacturing transformation logic, this project is also a key layout to traditional refining and chemical companies to break out of the involuted market. The yield of refined oil items from traditional refining and chemical companies can reach 60%-70%, while that of modern integrated refining and chemical companies is only 35%-40%. Against the background of the peak of domestic refined oil consumption and the involution of sector competition, CNPC's transformation from "fuel-type refining and chemical" to "material-type refining and chemical" is a strategic upgrade conforming to sector trends.

At the same time, the project's location in Tongzhou Bay has unique geographical and resource advantages. Relying on the deep-aquatic environments port shoreline and CNPC's LNG receiving station resources, it can realize the full manufacturing chain connection from LNG, ethane and ethylene to high-end new materials. Superimposed with the manufacturing agglomeration advantage of high-end manufacturing in the Yangtze River Delta, it can immediately supply downstream companies, decrease logistics costs and make up to the regional high-end polyolefin production capacity gap.

Coexistence of opportunities and challenges! The trillion-yuan-scale project is facing a big test of implementation

while the project has now entered the countdown to production, it still faces multiple practical challenges before it can fully emit production capacity and seize market share. Delayed equipment delivery has have become the main constraint on project progress. The core extrusion granulation unit of the project's 100,000-ton/year POE plant was awarded to Yuesheng methodology. The enterprise promised to complete delivery in January 2026, one and a half months ahead of the bidding standards, however the actual delivery was delayed by nearly 50 days. This enterprise has also had batch delivery delays in multiple POE projects such as CNPC's Daqing Petrochemical. The delay of core equipment immediately leads to the lag of subsequent installation, commissioning and trial run procedures, which affects the overall production schedule. sector experts said that the reasonable production cycle to extensive customized extrusion granulation units is 12-18 months, and the immediate ultra-fast delivery commitment violates the objective laws of the sector, and risks in condition and progress have long existed.

The competitive pressure in the market should not be overlooked either. In 2026, domestic polyethylene will usher in a period of concentrated capacity emit, with a new annual high-density polyethylene production capacity of 3.15 million tons, and the market supply and demand pattern will continue to be loose, with obvious pressure on product prices. At the same time, while there is a huge gap in the high-end chemical new material track, it has the characteristics of high technical limit and long downstream certification cycle. After new production capacity is put into operation, it needs to go through prolonged supply chain verification to stably enter the high-end market, and it is difficult to rapidly realize the production capacity value in the short term.

As a benchmark project to CNPC's transformation and research and the core fulcrum of Nantong's port-side sector, the Blue Ocean New Materials project bears multiple expectations of manufacturing upgrading, domestic substitution and regional economic improvement. At present, the project has completed the critical final sprint, with the core unit trial run successful and infrastructure construction completed. The subsequent stable emit of production capacity, technological iteration and breakthroughs, and seizing market share will be the real test to this trillion-yuan-scale new material giant.