(ICIS) -- The expansion of Austrian plastic maker Borealis's joint venture Borouge project in Abu Dhabi drove an 82% year-on-year gain in second-quarter net profits, the company's CEO said on Thursday.
Borealis reported a net profit of EUR 168m (USD 240m) for the three months to the end of June, on the back of sales of EUR 1.9bn. This was an increase from the same period of 2010, when the company recorded a net profit of EUR 92m and sales of EUR 1.6bn.
CEO Mark Garrett said that the second phase of capacity at the company's Abu Dhabi Polymers Company (Borouge) joint venture with state energy giant Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (Adnoc) drove profitability at the firm as polyolefin margins softened in Europe.
Borouge completed the second-phase expansion of its production complex at Ruwais, 240km (150 miles) west of the city of Abu Dhabi, in June 2010 and reported that it was producing commercial volumes from the facility in October of that year. It lifted the company's production capacity from 600 KTa of polyethylene (PE) to 1.2m tonnes/year of PE and 800 KTa of polypropylene (PP).