Air Liquide Geismar complex

Large load · 36597 HWY 30, Geismar, LA

The Air Liquide Geismar complex in Ascension Parish, Louisiana, is a three-air-separation-unit industrial gas site with an on-site cogeneration plant. The company's own description says all three air separation units are currently operational. The cogeneration plant supplies about 80 percent of the electricity used to power the facility, and the Geismar site also has a hydrogen purification unit and Air Liquide's largest U.S. transportation depot by output. Its grid relevance is therefore mainly the on-site cogeneration share of the plant's power.

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Overview

Connected load: 80 MW; operating

Air Liquide's U.S. news release says the Geismar complex has three air separation units, the first of which became operational in October 1999 and the second in February 2000. It also includes a Hydrogen Purification Unit and a cogeneration plant that supplies approximately 80 percent of the electricity used to power the facility. The cogeneration plant is the main source of power for the air separation units, while the site's transportation depot is the company's largest in the United States by output.

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The 1999 start-up: Air Liquide America Corp. started up the first of two air separation units in 1999 as part of a $150 million air separation and cogeneration complex at Geismar, its largest single U.S. industrial investment at the time. The trade report says the cogeneration unit had been operating since July, and that the new complex would supply gaseous oxygen, nitrogen and steam to Air Liquide's chemical and refining customers along the Mississippi River. The 80 MW cogeneration facility, fed by multiple sources of natural gas, provides power to the air separation units and supplies steam to neighboring chemical facilities.

Downstream supply network: The new Geismar plant supplies more than 5,200 tonnes per day of air separation products, including gaseous oxygen and nitrogen, to Air Liquide's existing pipeline network between Baton Rouge and New Orleans. The air separation units also supply liquid oxygen, nitrogen and argon for merchant distribution. Staggering the start-up of the two units was described as a way to optimize oxygen demand and capital costs, and the complex sits on the Mississippi River industrial corridor.