India's JBF and Oman Oil Company to Build PTA Plant in Oman

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Researched by Industrial Info Resources (Sugar Land, Texas)--Earlier this year, JBF Industries Limited (Mumbai, India) and state-owned Oman Oil Company (OOC) (Muscat, Oman) signed a memorandum of understanding, leading to the formation of a joint venture.

The joint venture recently submitted the necessary documentation to receive approval for expenditure to build a purified terephthalic acid (PTA) plant in Sohar, Oman's most developed city after the capital city, Muscat. Sohar has seen a boom in development in recent years, mainly from large investments in the industrial area located near Sohar Port, which was developed in 2002 and is one of the world's most well developed commercial ports.

The plant will be located in the Sohar industrial area adjacent to OOC's Oman Aromatics. PTA is produced from the liquid-phase catalysis of paraxylene in acetic acid, with manganese or cobalt acetate serving as the catalyst. Oman Aromatics is a well-known producer of paraxylene and will supply a feedstock directly to the new PTA plant via pipeline. If all goes according to schedule, the joint venture plans to start building in the second quarter of 2011 and complete the project in 2013. Once complete, the $680 million plant is anticipated to produce about 1.2 million tones of PTA annually.

Currently, the joint venture has no plans to export PTA to India. However, JBF will be on the receiving end if demand exceeds the supply in India. JBF is a synthetic yarn and polyester manufacturer. Most PTA is used in the polyester-fiber industry. PTA is also used to make polyethylene terephthalate (PET) bottle resin, but this industry has been in decline since as many companies are switching to lighter resins and consumers are buying less bottled water. Both the PET-bottle and polyester-fiber industries have seen a drop in demand since the beginning of the economic downturn.

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