TOTAL SLATES TWO ETBE UNIT AT IS FRENCH REFINERIES

Total plans to build an ethyl tertiary butyl ether (ETBE) unit of 920-1,020 b/d capacity each at its Dunkirk and Gonfreville, Normandy, France, refineries. Each is expected to cost 160 million francs ($27.2 million). The units are expected to go on stream in mid-1995. Total will use the ETBE as an additive to its unleaded gasoline. Total will have a 40% interest in each unit, to be built with French technology in association with agroindustrial groups and beet and cereal producers.

March 14, 1994

Total plans to build an ethyl tertiary butyl ether (ETBE) unit of 920-1,020 b/d capacity each at its Dunkirk and Gonfreville, Normandy, France, refineries.

Each is expected to cost 160 million francs ($27.2 million). The units are expected to go on stream in mid-1995. Total will use the ETBE as an additive to its unleaded gasoline.

Total will have a 40% interest in each unit, to be built with French technology in association with agroindustrial groups and beet and cereal producers.

In the Dunkirk unit, other interests will be held by agroindustrial group Eridania Beghin-Say 23%, Bio-Ethanol Nord Picardie 17%, and a beet cooperative and cereal cooperative 10% each. In the Gonfreville unit, other interests will be held by Ethanol Union 40%, and beet and cereal co-ops 10% each.

The units had been considered for some time and got a green fight after the French government signed two accords with investors guaranteeing that bioethanol will continue to benefit from a tax subsidy of 3.29 francs/l. until the units are amortized.

The tax break makes ETBE competitive with petroleum products.