Sabic's plans for 1m tonne/year cracker underway

24 October 2003 07:26  [Source: ICIS news]

SINGAPORE (CNI)--Sabic has firmed up plans for its next cracker, in Yanbu, Saudi Arabia, which would produce more than 1m tonne/year of ethylene, a senior company source told CNI's sister publication ACN.

He added that the derivatives of the cracker project would include polyethylene (PE), monoethylene glycol (MEG), styrene and polystyrene (PS). He was unable to give the capacities of the proposed downstream plants.

The source added that the project is expected to come onstream at around 2008. Ethane is likely to be used as a feedstock.

The project would not be pursued by Yanpet, the cracker joint venture between Sabic and ExxonMobil which also operates in Yanbu, he said.

Yanpet, currently the only cracker operator in Yanbu, currently owns two crackers with ethylene capacities of 860 000 tonne/ year and 880 000 tonne/year.

The Sabic source said that the new cracker could be pursued as a joint venture with other local or foreign majors.

Sabic revealed its intention to build one new cracker in Al-Jubail and another one in Yanbu in 2000. While plans for the cracker in Al-Jubail are well under way, Sabic had subsequently persistently declined to comment on the status of the Yanbu project, which many industry sources assumed had been abandoned.

Sabic has already started work on building a new cracker in Al-Jubail. It will be 100%-owned by Sabic and be operated by its subsidiary, Jubail United Petrochemical. The 1m tonne/year cracker complex is due to be completed at end-2004.

By: Clara Tan
+65 6780 4359

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