Equate’s new line to have on-spec MEG by year-end

07 August 2008 09:27  [Source: ICIS news]

SINGAPORE (ICIS news)--Equate Petrochemical Co expects its new 600,000 tonne/year monoethylene glycol (MEG) plant in Al-Shuaiba, Kuwait to achieve on-spec production only later this year, a source close to the company said on Thursday.

While declining to give the exact date the source said, “we’re testing the unit now and I think maybe a few months before year-end, we can have on-spec production.”

The unit was originally scheduled to start production in late July.  

“We need to wait for the cracker to start up too, which may be slightly later than the MEG unit, so we may need to run the plant at low rates [or import ethylene temporarily],” added the source.

The MEG line, part of Equate’s Olefins II project, includes an 850,000 tonne/year ethylene cracker and increased polyethylene capacity, which are scheduled to come onstream in September.

The new unit would increase the company’s overall MEG capacity to 1.15m tonnes/year.

Equate is a joint venture of Kuwait’s Petrochemical Industries Co (PIC), US-based Dow Chemical, and the investment arm of the Kuwaiti government.

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Author: Salmon Aidan Lee
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