By OGJ editors
HOUSTON, May 10 -- Saudi Aramco is making progress on three megaprojects in Saudi Arabia: the Rabigh Integrated Refinery and Petrochemical Complex, an export refinery, and a refining and petrochemical project at Ras Tanura and Ju'aymah.
Isam A. Al-Bayat, Saudi Aramco vice-president for new business development, reported on the projects at a May 9 conference in Dammam.
The Rabigh project, which began May 2004, is scheduled to come on stream in the third quarter of 2008. Saudi Aramco and Sumitomo Chemical of Japan are converting the 400,000 b/d Rabigh refinery into an integrated refinery and petrochemical complex (OGJ Online, May 11, 2004).
For the proposed export refinery, with 400,000 b/d of capacity at an undetermined site, Saudi Aramco has approached international capital markets to assess investor interest, Al-Bayat said. The facility would cost $4-5 billion.
Saudi Aramco also is considering the addition of petrochemicals capacity based on feedstocks from the Ras Tanura refinery and Ju'aymah industrial area. The Ras Tanura complex includes a 325,000 b/d hydrocracking refinery and a 200,000 b/d condensate splitter.
Petrochemical facilities under consideration for the integration project include a large ethane-naphtha cracker, an aromatics recovery complex, and complementary downstream derivative units to produce secondary petrochemicals. The estimated project cost is $6 billion, Al-Bayat said.
He said Saudi Aramco is beginning an "unprecedented era" of capital expansion, with expenditures on materials and equipment in excess of $20 billion and on services of more than $23 billion through 2010.
