United Arab Emirates Looks to Future with Plans for Al Gharbia Chemical Site

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Researched by Industrial Info Resources (Sugar Land, Texas)--Abu Dhabi National Chemicals Company (ADNOC) (Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates) will invest more than $7.6 billion in a new petrochemical production facility in Ruwais Al Gharbia, United Arab Emirates (UAE). The site will be composed of more than 23 production units that will more than 10.5 million metric tons of chemicals per year.

The site has been planned for quite some time, with Neste Jacobs (Porvoo, Finland) being awarded the front-end engineering and design (FEED) contract for the polyethylene and polypropylene units in the first half of 2009. The project was originally planned to be built in Khalifa Port, but the location was changed to Ruwais Al Gharbia so it could be closer to the necessary feedstock for the site. The site will be anchored by a 1.45 million-metric-ton-per-year ethylene unit, which also will produce 690,000 metric tons per year of propylene.

The site also will produce polyethylene, polypropylene, phenol, paraxylene, benzene, cumene, acetone, bisphenol-A, monoethylene glycol (MEG), ethanolamines, methyl tert butyl ether (MTBE) and xylenes, to name a few.

Halcrow (London, England) is serving as the master planner for the new Al Gharbia site, developing the necessary infrasctrure to support such a massive complex. While the site has received much excitement and enthusiasm, the selection of an engineering and construction contractor is still two years away at best.

Foster Wheeler (Zug, Switzerland) is currently serving as project management consultant (PMC) for the ongoing FEED phase of the aromatic units. Foster Wheeler is intent on bidding for the PMC contract to head up the selection of the multiple engineering and construction firms needed to engineer and build the site, which could be a three years away.

Ruwais Al Gharbia is located in the state of Abu Dhabi, which is in the western area of the small but rich UAE, and contributes more than 50% of the country's gross domestic product (GDP). Ruwais' coastal location offers access to ports, berths and pipelines that quickly and efficiently import and export needed feedstock and produced chemicals to be delivered to the world markets. The chemical sector is the second-highest valued industrial sector in the UAE behind energy, which includes the country's oil refineries.

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