Thailand’s PTTGC on track to start up new cracker by 2020

SINGAPORE (ICIS)–Thailand-based producer PTT Global Chemical (PTTGC) is on track with its plans to start up a new flexible feed cracker at its production site in Map Ta Phut by 2020, a company spokesperson said on Wednesday.

The company has already issued the conceptual design for the cracker to licensors and is aiming to start building the unit in early 2018, the spokesperson said without elaborating on the parties involved in the project.

The cracker will be able to produce 500,000 tonnes/year of ethylene and 261,000 tonnes/year of propylene, according to the spokesperson.

The new unit is part of PTTGC’s $4.5bn project to “retrofit” its Map Ta Phut site.

The company plans to utilise the naphtha surplus from its refinery to feed the new cracker, the company said in an earlier presentation to analysts.

Only 15% of the 1.8m tonnes/year of light naphtha is currently used for PTTGC’s internal usage while the remainder is either sold to domestic producer Siam Cement or exported, PTTGC said.

The new naphtha cracker will create new product opportunities along the company’s value chain, it said.

PTTGC could potentially establish new plants for acrylic acid, polypropylene (PP), superabsorbent polymers (SAP), styrene monomer (SM), polystyrene compounds and acrylonitrile butadiene styrene (ABS) with the additional output from the cracker, according to the company.

The cracker will also help support a new 300,000 tonnes/year metallocene linear low density polyethylene (MLLDPE) plant at Map Ta Phut that is expected to come on stream in the first quarter of 2018, it said.

Meanwhile, the company is planning to make a final investment decision on a propylene oxide (PO) and polyols project in the fourth quarter of this year, according to the spokesperson.

The project is expected to come on stream in the second quarter of 2019, the spokesperson said.

The company last year has signed an agreement with Japan’s Toyota Tsusho Corp to jointly perform an engineering study for a new 200,000 tonnes/year PO unit.

PTTGC also signed an agreement with Toyota Tsusho Corp and Sanyo Chemical Industries for the potential development of a 130,000 tonnes/year polyether polyols plant.

With additional reporting by Yeow Pei Lin

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