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• First Person - Frank Edwards
Thirty years ago, China was incapable of designing and building its own process plants (installations in which chemical or physical change takes place, for instance in chemical fertiliser and petro-chemical plants), yet today it can build plants on a par with anyone. Frank Edwards, who first went to China in 1970, watched the transformation at first hand.
Humphreys & Glasgow (H&G) was probably the first company to sell a process plant to China. That was in 1896 when H&G sold a towns gas plant to Shanghai for lighting, heating and cooking based on burning coal and coke. Further gas plants were sold to China between 1900 and 1933. All engineering was carried out in London and a complete gas production facility was exported from the UK, together with instructions for installation and commissioning under guidance of H&G specialists.
In October 1963 Humphreys & Glasgow obtained its first order from China since the founding of the People's Republic in 1949. The contract was for a 300 ton/day ammonia plant for production of nitrogen fertilisers at Luzhou, Sichuan province.
The then H&G sales director had persuaded a friend of his in ICI, who had met Premier Zhou Enlai, to write to him about H&G's ammonia plant capabilities.
Some time later the H&G sales director was invited to meet a Chinese delegation in Switzerland and subsequently he took a standard proposal for an ammonia plant to Beijing. Unbelievably, a contract for several million pounds was awarded within two weeks. H&G had no need to make a press announcement because Reuters obtained the news the morning the contract was signed and sent it to all newspapers stating it was the first complete plant ever sold by the UK to the People's Republic of China.
Few people went to China in the mid-1960s when the Luzhou ammonia plant was constructed and commissioned. The H&G site personnel had a very restricted life between the site and a small guesthouse located in a walled compound with locked gates. Transport was provided each morning and evening to and from the site with an occasional visit to the local town. This called for people not only with high technical competence but also with the ability to accept such a lifestyle for many months at a time.
A feature of contracts at that time was the great importance placed by Communist countries on the quoted weights of all equipment and materials. These had to be included in the final quotation. Contract suppliers could be penalised for departures from guaranteed maximum and minimum weights. The Chinese were no exception and even the thousands of firebricks for the ammonia plant reformer furnace were checked and weighed.
By the 1970s competition in the process plant sector was growing, particularly from Japan, Germany and the USA, following President Nixon's visit in 1972 which resulted in an order for Kellogg for eight 1,000 ton/day ammonia plants.
Thirty years ago it was difficult to contact the end user. One had to deal with organisations like the China National Technical Import Corporation, Machimpex and representatives of the State Planning Commission. In the late 1970s H&G partially solved this problem by sending a team of specialists to give a series of lectures on such subjects as coal gasification, fertilisers and the recovery of natural gas liquids.
The H&G team was taken to visit a gasworks where they witnessed an H&G plant supplied in 1907 and upgraded in 1933 still operating.
Also in the late 1970s the Chinese began to accept consultants. This became apparent during a SBTC mission led by Lord Nelson. Ricardo became the first British company to obtain a consultancy contract, for advice on how the Chinese could improve their diesel engine production.
In the late 1980s H&G modernised the Luzhou plant. This time, Chinese engineers came to London to help produce a basic design package in H&G's offices. The plans were taken back to Chengdu, where the local design institute carried out the detailed engineering under H&G supervision. Some of the equipment came from Chinese suppliers and the plant was formally opened in 1990 by the British ambassador, Sir Alan Donald.
Today, China has a first-class capability to design and supply many of its own process plants. However, there is still scope for the supply of special packages by foreign companies. One thing that does remain relatively unchanged is how to approach the China market and current prospects. Asked this very question some 30 years ago I gave the answer: with knowledge, resources, patience and determination. Today's advisors seem to be of the same opinion.
Frank Edwards was deputy chairman of Humphreys & Glasgow when he retired in 1992. He was a vice-president of SBTC and subsequently CBTG and also a member of The 48 Group management committee. He played an active role in the discussions that led to the merger of SBTC and The 48 Group.
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