Qafco to construct $610m urea plant in Qatar

LONDON (ICIS news)–Qatar Fertilizer Company (Qafco) has signed a letter of intent to begin the construction of a 1.4m tonne/year urea plant estimated to cost $610m (€415m), company shareholder Yara said on Monday.

The fertilizer company added in a statement that Qafco had signed the letter of intent with a consortium that includes Italian company Saipem and Korea’s Hyundai for the engineering, procurement and construction of the plant.

“The Qafco-6 project includes the construction of a urea plant with a total daily production capacity of 3,850 tonnes. The construction work is scheduled to take approximately 35-months with the completion around the end of third quarter 2012,” it added.

Qafco, which is majority owned by Industries Qatar, is currently building two ammonia plants with total annual production capacity of 1.7m tonnes and a urea plant with annual nameplate capacity of 1.4m tonnes. The plant, known as Qafco-5 is due to be completed by the end of the first-quarter of 2011.

“Upon completion of Qafco-6 project, Qafco’s total annual production capacity will increase to around 3.8m tonnes of ammonia and 5.6m tonnes of urea,” the statement added.

The Qafco fertilizer complex is based in Mesaieed Industrial City, 40km south of Doha.

($1 = €0.68)

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