UAE Borouge Increasing PP/PE Capacity

United Arab Emirates plastics producer, Borouge is planning to increase its polyolefins including Polyethylene and Polypropylene capacity by 2.5m tonnes per annum by the end of 2014 under a feasibility study for the expansion project, codenamed Borouge 3.

The additional feedstock will be supplied Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (Adnoc) through its planned expansions at upstream which if succeeded will boost Borouge's total production capacity to 4.5m tonnes/year to meet the growing demands of polyethylene and polypropylene markets in the Middle East and Asia.

Analysts expect that the feasibility study will be successful since Borouge is a 40:60 joint venture between Borealis and Adnoc.

Nigeria Planning MTO Project Using UOP Technology

Nigeria will be home to 1.3 mil tonne per year capacity olefins complex using MTO technology by UOP in Lagos. The project is the first MTO technology that would be constructed at commercial-scale including olefins cracking process technologies by EuroChem.

The project would produce 10000 tonnes per day of methanol capacity from natural gas due for completion in 2012 and the MTO technology is expected to be more cost effective than traditional olefins production from crude oil-derived feedstocks.

Upon completion, the MTO plant would give a competitive edge against other petrochemical producers using normal technology such as steam cracker and dehydrogenation.