Doha, January 20, 2004 - Qatar Petroleum and LG Engineering & Construction Corporation signed today the Engineering Procurement & Construction contract for the Linear Alkyl Benzene Project.

His Excellency Abdullah Bin Hamad Al Attiyah, Second Deputy Premier, Minister of Energy and Industry, signed the agreement on behalf of Qatar Petroleum and Mr. S.R. Woo, Chief Executive Officer and Executive Vice President of LG Corp. signed on behalf of the Korean Corporation. Senior officials from Qatar Petroleum and LG Corp attended the signing ceremony, held at the Inter-Continental Hotel in Doha.

The LAB Project represents the implementation of the vision of H.H. the Emir, Sheikh Hamad Bin Khalifa Al Thani, to diversify sources of income of the State of Qatar by achieving optimum utilization of the country's natural oil and gas resources. In compliance with directives of His Highness, a feasibility and marketing study was conducted for Linear Alkyl Benzene (LAB) Project and based on its report and after completing the Basis Design Package a tender package was distributed to selected international companies for the EPC type contract to build the plant for Linear Alkyl Benzene product which is widely used in household detergents.

The Linear Alkyl Benzene will be produced from Normal- Paraffin and Benzene. The N-Paraffin shall be designed to process hydrotreated straight run Kerosene from Qatar Petroleum Refinery, and Benzene will be produced from Reformate and treated Pyrogasoline. The new plant location was selected to be within the Qatar Petroleum Refinery boundary limits to benefit from the utilization of the existing utilities as electric power, cooling water, instrument air, and jetty in order to reduce the capital cost of the Project.

LG Engineering and Construction Corp. has been selected and awarded the EPC Contract after technical evaluation and commercial evaluation. UOP Company based in the U.K is the licensor and owns the Royalty for Engineering, License and Guarantee.

The environmental issues will be given the highest importance in the different stages of the Project. The new facilities will be designed to meet the QP and Qatar Regulatory requirements as embodied in the environmental policy and the international environmental standards. The project will be designed and constructed to provide healthy, safe and environmental friendly facilities.

Major Features of the Project

N-Paraffin plant capacity of 80,000 MTA and Linear Alkyl Benzene plant capacity of 100,000 MTA and extracting Benzene from Reformate and treated Pyrogasoline from Benzene Units with plant capacity 36,000 MTA.

Constructing of export terminal new tanks for intermediate and finished products, and product export and shipping facilities.

The total Contract Price for EPC phase exceeds US$235 million. The Project is scheduled as Fast Track Project and planned to be commissioned during first quarter of 2006.

-Ends-

© Press Release 2005