2002—Emergence of the Gas-to-Liquids Industry:a Review of Global GTL Developments

This paper reviews the status of the gas-to-liquids (GTL) industry-including current commercial plants, announced projects and the technologies that are likely to be implemented in these future projects. Today, only 35,000 B/D of GTL products (0.1% of market) are manufactured from commercial gas-based plants. Advances in technology have lowered the cost of plants to the point where GTL plants can be profitable at crude oil prices of ＄16/B. The advanced stage of development of several proposed GTL projects and attractive integrated economics, for both the gas field and plant, show that GTL can be a significant alternative for monetizing natural gas in the 21st century. GTL technologies includes more than Fischer-Tropsch technology and extends to other liquid fuels, especially in the oxygenate family (methanol, dimethyl ether, etc.).