Doha, June 15, 2002
Qatar Petroleum and its partners; Qatar Petrochemical Company (Qapco), Chevron Phillips Chemical Company and Atofina, have agreed on Thursday to set up $ 2 billion petrochemical projects.
The agreement involves three projects to be commissioned by mid-2007. Two of them will be in Mesaieed Industrial City and the other one at Ras Laffan.
Q-Chem II, the first project, is a joint venture between QP (51%) and Chevron Phillips (49%) will be established adjacent to the existing Q-Chem I at Mesaieed. It comprises two plants of high density polyethylene (HDPE) and normal alpha olefin (NAO).
The second project, Qatofin; Qapco ( 63%), Atofina (36%), and QP ( 1%), will establish a world scale linear low-density polyethylene plant (LLDPE) adjacent to the Qapco facilities at Mesaieed.
The third venture, which is between QP (1%), Q-Chem II (53.31%), and Qatofina (45.69%), will be based at Ras Laffan.
Briefing reporters after signing agreements for the three ventures, HE Abdullah Bin Hamad Al-Attiyah, the Minister of Energy and Industry, said the ethane cracker unit at Ras Laffan with a capacity of 1.3 MMTA of ethylene will be among the largest in the world. The derivative plants of the ethane cracker unit will be located at Mesaieed within the existing facilities of Q-Chem I and Qapco.
Q-Chem II will have a capacity of 350,000 MT a year of normal alpha olefin and another 350,000MT a year of high density polyethylene. The new Qatofin plant at Qapco will produce 450,000MT a year of polyethylene.
The Minister said the ethane feedstock to the cracker unit would be supplied from the nearby Enhanced Gas Utilization (EGU) project and Dolphin project's onshore facilities.
A new ethylene pipeline form Ras Laffan to Mesaieed will supply ethylene to the NAO and HDPE plants of Q-Chem II and the LLDPE plant of Qatofin.
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© Press Release 2005
