Mo Dingge, a professor-level senior engineer and deputy to the 14th National People’s Congress, has led China National Chemical Engineering Group Co., Ltd. (CNCEC) as Party secretary and chairman since March 2024. He concurrently serves as Party secretary of China National Chemical Engineering Co., Ltd. At 57 (born February 1969 in Xiangshan, Zhejiang), the Han Chinese executive brings three decades of hands-on petrochemical experience to one of China’s most complete chemical engineering groups—the “national team” of the industry and a global leader in oil-and-gas services.
From Workshop Floor to Corporate Helm
Mo graduated in 1991 from the construction management program at Xi’an Metallurgical Architecture College (now Xi’an University of Architecture and Technology). He began his career as an ordinary refining-and-chemical worker at Sinopec Zhenhai Refining & Chemical Company, then China’s largest integrated refining complex. Over three decades he rose steadily: deputy manager of the engineering company, deputy director and later director of the engineering department, deputy chief engineer, vice general manager, general manager, and finally company representative and Party secretary. He was the first major leader of Zhenhai to be cultivated entirely from within the ranks—an embodiment, colleagues note, of the industry ethos “love the work, master the work, refine the work.”
His tenure at Zhenhai coincided with both crisis and renaissance. Revenue fell sharply to 84.75 billion yuan in 2020 amid external shocks. Under Mo’s push for lean management—cutting redundancy, eliminating information silos, and simplifying processes—the company rebounded to 156.8 billion yuan by 2022. Key technical milestones included co-development of a million-ton ethylene package that won a National Science and Technology Progress Award (First Class) and full localization of technology once reliant on imported components. Zhenhai also commercialized Asia’s first 100,000-ton-per-year bio-jet-fuel unit, capable of consuming a year’s worth of recycled “gutter oil” from a city of ten million. By the end of the 14th Five-Year Plan period the base was projected to generate 300 billion yuan in annual output value—the goal of “rebuilding a higher-quality Zhenhai.” Cumulative taxes paid exceeded 431.1 billion yuan over 49 years, with local fiscal contributions of more than 65.4 billion yuan.
Taking the Helm at CNCEC
When Mo arrived at CNCEC in early 2024, the group already possessed the industry’s most complete qualifications, longest business chain, and densest knowledge base. Under the previous leadership, revenue had climbed from 58.6 billion yuan in 2017 to 157.7 billion yuan in 2022. The company had pivoted from pure engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) toward a dual identity as both an industrial-engineering solutions provider and a supplier of high-end chemicals and advanced materials. Flagship projects such as Tianchen Yaolong’s caprolactam, Tianchen Qixiang’s adiponitrile and Hualu’s aerogel demonstrated mastery of core technologies at international standards.
Mo’s early public appearances—multiple meetings with international partners and emphasis on expanding overseas markets—signaled continuity with an intensified outward orientation. Overseas revenue has since reached roughly 30 percent of the group total. He has repeatedly framed the company’s mission in vivid terms: engineering’s essence is “turning wasteland into prosperity.” The “second growth curve,” he insists, is not scale for its own sake but extension into high-end materials, green and low-carbon technologies, and intelligent manufacturing—an “intensive leap driven by scientific and technological innovation.”
Strategy: Innovation, Green Color, and “Contract Going Global”
Central to Mo’s vision is the slogan “lights blazing for research, lights blazing for commercialization.” Speed of R&D and speed of translation into market value are treated as inseparable. The group has institutionalized the “T+EPC” and “T+industry” models, in which proprietary technology (T) is fused with engineering execution and industrial investment. Five categories of technology—process, engineering, equipment, management and product—are viewed as the collective foundation of high-quality development. Focus sectors include new materials, new energy, green ecology and fine chemicals.
Green is described not as an add-on but as the industry’s original color. Pollution control and emission reduction are themselves complex chemical processes; the most effective solutions begin at the design stage with advanced processes and equipment that lower energy intensity and emissions at source. Mo has highlighted “energy–chemical integration”—renewable power for hydrogen production, hydrogen combined with biogenic carbon to create materials—as a strategic direction. Ecological restoration, including protection of the Qinling Mountains, is treated as part of the group’s core responsibility.
Internationally, Mo advocates “contract going global” as the vehicle for exporting Chinese technology, standards, capital and industrial capacity along the Belt and Road. He has called for national-level model contracts tailored to Belt and Road projects, a dedicated contract-support center offering interpretation and risk assessment, and stronger legal and arbitration networks. The aim is both commercial return and greater Chinese influence in global engineering governance—“a protective armor” for enterprises going abroad so that the “China brand” carries fuller substance. Partnerships with firms such as Fluor, KBR and Spanish TR, as well as strategic dialogues in Hong Kong and with provincial leaders across China, underscore the dual domestic–international thrust.
Governance, Reform and Local Collaboration
Inside the group Mo has pressed organizational flattening, penetrating management, and dual-drive innovation in technology and management. Tools such as the “three plan tables” and “nine special actions” target cost control, project profitability and brand building. Projects are expected to be “built fast, stand firm, deliver returns and earn reputation.” As an NPC deputy he has submitted concrete proposals on accelerating the biodegradable-plastics industry: national planning, mandatory standards that phase out incomplete degradable products, a national special fund for R&D, and fiscal incentives to cluster the value chain.
Collaboration with universities (notably Tianjin University) and national laboratories is framed as essential to the “industry–university–research–application” continuum. Meetings with provincial leaders in Guizhou, Gansu, Zhejiang and elsewhere emphasize matching central-enterprise capabilities with local needs—whether advanced manufacturing bases, clean-coal utilization or new-materials clusters.
Outlook
Mo describes “higher quality” development as the elevation of comprehensive capability, especially that driven by science and technology: more prominent core functions, stronger competitiveness, optimized industrial layout, more efficient governance and a sharper green profile. The “doubling plan” is explicitly not volume stacking but an intensive leap. With overseas revenue already a major growth pole, green technologies maturing, and the “T+EPC / T+industry” model gaining traction, the group positions itself to complete the 14th Five-Year Plan on a solid foundation and to open the 15th as a world-class innovative engineering enterprise.
In Mo’s own words, the task is straightforward if demanding: keep the lights on for research, keep the lights on for commercialization, and turn technological advantage into sustainable value for the enterprise, for China’s industrial system, and for partners along the Belt and Road.