Romania's Petrom considers petchem spin-off

21 February 2007 15:23  [Source: ICIS news]

PRAGUE (ICIS news)--Petrom is considering a spin-off of its petrochemicals business, the Romanian company said on Wednesday.

However, the company added that it was too early to say whether it would go ahead with a proposal to decouple the Arpechim refinery petrochemical operations into a new subsidiary called Petrochemical Arges.

Wood & Company investment bank said Petrom did not consider petrochemicals to be a core business.

“A big question mark of the petchem strategy is the long delayed privatisation of [state-held] Oltchim. The polyvinyl chloride (PVC) producer is Petrom’s biggest petchem customer (it is linked by an ethylene pipeline) so any investment decision for Petrom hangs on Oltchim," the bank said.

On 8 February, Oltchim said it had started negotiations with Petrom to buy its pyrolysis unit.

Petrom, majority owned by Austria’s OMV, has the capacity to produce 170,000 tonnes/year of ethylene, 90,000 tonnes/year of polyethylene, 62,000 tonnes/year of ammonia, 50,000 tonnes/year of urea and 72,000 tonnes/year of methanol.

By: Will Conroy
+44 20 8652 3214

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