Announcement of the $6 billion FID by QatarEnergy and Chevron to build the Ras Laffan Petrochemicals complex was made in Doha in a special ceremony during which Saad Sherida Al-Kaabi, the Minister of State for Energy Affairs, the President and CEO of QatarEnergy, and Bruce Chinn, the President and CEO of Chevron Phillips Chemical, signed the agreement for a joint venture company to implement the project. (Source: QatarEnergy)
QatarEnergy and Chevron Phillips Chemical Co. LLC (CPChem) announced a $6 billion final investment decision (FID) to build the Ras Laffan Petrochemicals complex in Ras Laffan Industrial City some 50 miles north of Doha, Qatar.
The complex is slated to start production in 2026, QatarEnergy announced Jan. 8 in a press release. The state company will own a 70% equity share, and CPChem will own the remaining 30%.
“This marks QatarEnergy’s largest investment ever in Qatar’s petrochemicals sector and the first direct investment in 12 years,” said Qatar’s Minister of State for Energy Affairs Saad Sherida Al-Kaabi, who also serves as president and CEO of QatarEnergy. “It will double our ethylene production capacity, increase our local polymer production from 2.6 to more than 4 million tons per annum [mpta] and place the utmost emphasis on sustainable growth and the environment.”
The Ras Laffan complex will contain an ethane cracker with a 2.1 mtpa capacity of ethylene, making it the largest in the Middle East and one of the largest in the world. The complex will also include two polyethylene trains with a combined output of 1.7 mtpa of high-density polyethylene (HDPE) polymer products, boosting Qatar’s overall petrochemical production capacity to almost 14 mtpa.
The engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contract for the ethylene plant was awarded by QatarEnergy to SCJV, a joint venture between South Korea’s Samsung Engineering Company Ltd. and Taiwan’s CTCI. Italy’s Maire Tecnimont was awarded the EPC contract for the polyethylene plant, while the U.S.’ Emerson was awarded the main automation contract.
Ras Laffan Industrial City spans 295 sq km and is the onshore base for the processing of gas and other hydrocarbons produced offshore Qatar in the North Field. The field contains total recoverable gas of over 900 Tcf and is considered the largest single non-associated gas reservoir in the world, according to QatarEnergy.
The FID for the Qatari petrochemicals complex comes less than two months after QatarEnergy and Chevron Phillips Chemical announced an FID to execute the $8.5 billion Golden Triangle Polymers Plant on the U.S. Gulf Coast in Texas.
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