Doha - A multi-billion mega petrochemical complex being developed in Mesaieed will provide raw materials and many opportunities for the Qatari private sector to implement new small and medium size projects.
The new Qatar Petrochemicals Complex (QPCC) is being developed in a 70:30 partnership between Qatar Intermediate Industries Holding Company (Qatar Holding) and Honam Petrochemical Corporation of South Korea. Qatar Holding is a fully owned affiliate of Qatar Petroleum (QP) and mandated to establish and operate intermediate and other industrial projects, individually or jointly with other partners.
The company has set a goal to become a leading Middle East manufacturer and marketer of intermediate and final petrochemical and non-hydrocarbon products. Mohammed Khalifa Turki Al-Sobai, Managing director and Chief Executive Officer of Qatar Holding (QH) said the complex comprising four integrated plants will produce around 2.8 million tonnes per year of petrochemical products.
Al Sobai was speaking at the Industrial Investment Opportunities in Qatar seminar which opened here yesterday. The grassroots petrochemical complex will use primarily the available feedstock from Mesaieed and Ras Laffan operating and planned projects. The feedstocks will comprise different types of naphta which will represent over 75 percent and the remainder will be ethane gas, less than 25 percent.
Al Sobai said the complex which will come on stream by 2012 end will be producing such products as propylene, polypropylene, styrene and polystyrene. The first phase of the project will comprise a mixed ethane and naphta cracker with ethylene capacity of about one million tonnes per year and will include special process units to convert some ethylene to propylene. The complex will produce polypropylene, polystyrene, ethylene glycol and mixed xylenes among others which in turn will provide raw materials and many investment opportunities.
Qatar Holding is also planning to expand the bases of the available polymers, plastics and intermediate petrochemical in the country, by implementing subsequent phased viable projects, which should provide further investment opportunities.
Al Sobai said the total value of all projects that Qatar Holding is implementing stands at between $7bn and $8 bn. Among the projects being undertaken by Qatar Holding is a melamine plant project, a joint venture between Qatar Fertiliser Company (QAFCO) and Qatar Holding which is expected to be completed by next year. It will be the world's second largest melamine plant and the largest in the Middle East.
It is also developing a composite cylinder project to produce plastic cylinders for household LPG use which is in construction tendering stage and a geomembrane project which will produce isolation sheets from locally produced polyethylene for use in construction of infrastructure such as roads.
© The Peninsula 2008
