Sultan Al-Sughair

Saudi Gazette

JUBAIL – Saudi Basic Industries Corporation (SABIC) and Japan’s Mitsubishi Rayon Company (MRC) are preparing to float the tender for the engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contract for two new petrochemicals plants worth about $500m in Jubail.



Mohammed Hilal, a SABIC official, said that the tender will be floated very soon and the partners are pre-qualifying contractors now.



“It isn’t a massive project, but it is still of interest to a lot of contractors,” he said.



Hilal said that the two plants, to be built at Jubail Industrial City, will produce methyl methacrylate (MMA) and polymethylmethacrylate (PMMA). The capacity for the MMA facility will be 250,000 tonnes a year, which will make it the largest of its type in the world. The PMMA plant is smaller in scale and will have a capacity of 40,000 t/y.



MMA and PMMA have a number of downstream uses including machinery, electrical components and gears, and both facilities fall in line with Sabic’s move to become a key player in the kingdom’s downstream industries.



SABIC and Lucite International, a subsidiary of MRC, are 50:50 joint venture partners for the project.