Saudi International Petrochemical Co. (Sipchem) announced earlier this month that affiliate International Polymers Co. has awarded the engineering design, procurement, and construction work for an ethylene vinyl acetate (EVA) plant to G.S. Engineering & Construction Corp., South Korea.

Qatar Petroleum and Shell have signed a memorandum of understanding to study development of a large petrochemicals complex in Ras Laffan Industrial City, Qatar.

Enterprise Products Partners LP, Houston, paid $38.5 million for a plant on the Houston Ship Channel that produces high-purity isobutylene (HPIB).

Total SA and China Power Investment Corp. have agreed to study construction of a petrochemical plant based on methanol derived from coal in China.

Carbon Holdings of Egypt has let a project management consultancy contract to Foster Wheeler USA Corp. for a polyethylene facility at a petrochemical complex it is developing in Ain Sokhna, Egypt.

Methanex New Zealand is likely to spend $50 million (NZ) in refurbishment and restart of the second train at its Motunui methanol complex near New Plymouth in the country’s North Island.

China Shenhua Coal to Liquid & Chemical Co. Ltd. has started up was is being called by the firm the “world’s first methanol-to-olefins unit to be operated on a commercial scale” in Baotou, China.

Petronas agreed to buy BP PLC’s Malaysian ethylene and polyethylene production for $363 million in a transaction expected to close by yearend, subject to certain conditions.

China Shenhua Coal to Liquid & Chemical Co. Ltd. has started the gasification unit at a large coal-to-olefins demonstration project in Baotou, Inner Mongolia.

State-owned Ecopetrol of Colombia has let a contract to Mustang for conceptual engineering and technology evaluation to optimize polymer production at a planned petrochemical complex.