The official theme of World Environment Day 2026 is "Comprehensive Green Transformation, Jointly Building a Beautiful China", which advocates the philosophy that lucid waters and lush mountains are invaluable assets. Guided by carbon peaking and carbon neutrality goals, China prioritizes coordinated carbon reduction, pollution abatement, ecological expansion and high-quality economic growth. In response to the national initiative, Qingdao Petrochemical launched an online virtual open day via live streaming. The live broadcast guided the public to visit its green factory remotely, enabling the public to observe on-site petrochemical production procedures, perceive the dynamic green upgrading of traditional refineries and experience intelligent petrochemical operation technologies without offline access.
Qingdao Petrochemical’s 1.6 million tons per year delayed coking unit was designed by Luoyang Petrochemical Engineering Corporation (LPEC). It achieved successful one-time commissioning on January 10, 2010. The original open hydraulic decoking process featured simple workflows and stable operational safety. However, it caused persistent environmental hazards including coke powder diffusion and unorganized volatile organic compound (VOC) fugitive emissions in the coke storage yard.
To cut VOC fugitive emissions and improve overall environmental performance, Qingdao Petrochemical invested RMB 48.73 million in 2025 to complete closed decoking waste gas treatment renovation. The project adopted a combined technical process of lye absorption and heating furnace incineration for centralized collection and harmless disposal of decoking waste gas. Intelligent remote traveling cranes are deployed to realize automatic water control and coke stacking inside enclosed coke pools, eliminating manual high-risk operations in open yards.
The renovation completely solved long-term coke powder air pollution in the coke yard, optimized on-site working environments and boosted operational efficiency. Verified monitoring data proved VOC emission reduction exceeding 90%, bringing prominent ecological and social benefits. The project marks a milestone in the company’s clean production system iteration.
On December 31, 2025, Qingdao Petrochemical’s circulating water waste heat utilization project was officially put into commercial operation. As the country’s first cascade energy utilization project coupling petrochemical industrial waste heat with municipal natural gas heating, it was jointly developed by Sinopec and local state-owned enterprises to complement resource advantages. The project built a closed-loop energy supply chain: waste heat recovery → cascade temperature rise → municipal centralized heating, converting low-grade circulating water waste heat generated from refining processes into stable clean heating energy.
Annually, the project supplies more than 600,000 gigajoules of clean thermal energy, covering central heating for 2 million square meters of urban buildings. It directly cuts municipal natural gas consumption and curtails emissions of carbon dioxide, nitrogen oxides and sulfides. The replicable operational model is named the "Qingdao Petrochemical Model" for cross-industry green low-carbon transformation reference.
Qingdao Petrochemical takes technological innovation as the core driver of low-carbon development. The company deploys professional environmental monitoring equipment including Leak Detection and Repair (LDAR) detectors and infrared thermal imagers to collect full-dimensional emission data for all equipment sealing points and vertical storage tanks. Two layers of monitoring networks are constructed: factory boundary ambient air quality stations and regional VOC fixed monitoring points. The system supports real-time early warning, emission source tracing and dynamic data analysis. Relying on refined investigation, targeted rectification and lean daily management, the company continuously optimizes on-site environmental control and improves ambient air quality in surrounding residential areas.
Centered on waste reduction, resource recovery and harmless disposal, Qingdao Petrochemical made breakthroughs in solid waste technical upgrading in 2025. By optimizing alkaline water stripping alkaline residue injection processes and adopting mechanical tank cleaning and sludge volume reduction technologies, the company recycled 110 tons of alkaline residue. It also promoted three types of oily sludge reprocessing via delayed coking negative coke production lines, with total sludge reprocessing volume reaching 12,166 tons in 2025.
In terms of supply chain management, the company issued detailed green material procurement guidelines, achieving a 97.5% green packaging usage rate in 2025. A total of 151.36 tons of waste materials were standardized disposed via Sinopec Yipike e-commerce platform. The enterprise was awarded the 2025 Sinopec Zero-Waste Enterprise honor. For 2026 planning, Qingdao Petrochemical has completed third-party assessment scheme formulation and initial sampling for spent catalyst hazard elimination identification, with secondary sampling proceeding on schedule.
Adhering to the corporate philosophy of operating for social public interests, Qingdao Petrochemical carries out regular environmental outreach activities including community green public welfare lectures and campus environmental science popularization. Since 2019, it has normalized public open day activities including offline energy exploration tours and online virtual open days. To date, over 60 sessions have been held, attracting more than 3 million online and offline participants. The activities help the public understand intelligent refining and end-of-pipe environmental facilities, reshaping the image of an environment-friendly urban refinery. From 2016 to 2025, cumulative environmental investment reached RMB 270 million, covering VOC governance, wastewater advanced treatment, flue gas purification and green R&D.
Under national green low-carbon strategic deployment, Qingdao Petrochemical fulfills statutory environmental protection responsibilities comprehensively. The enterprise will continue to promote integrated development between urban public facilities and petrochemical production, and build a benchmark urban low-carbon refinery with zero environmental conflicts.
