MOSCOW (MRC) -- Dow Chemical has completed the inaugural shipment of its DOW FILMTEC reverse osmosis elements from its new Dow Water & Process Solutions (DW&PS) manufacturing facility in Jubail, Saudi Arabia, said Hydrocarbonprocessing.
This first shipment is targeted to serve emerging markets. A first of its kind built outside the US, the new reverse osmosis (RO) production facility came on-stream in December 2015 to better serve the local Saudi Arabian market and help meet aggressively growing demands for RO in Middle East and Africa regions, as well as Eastern Europe, India, China and Southeast Asia.
Dow’s wholly-owned Jubail operations plant is located in Jubail Industrial City II within the fully integrated Sadara Chemical complex, the joint venture developed by Dow and Saudi Aramco. The plant manufactures FILMTEC RO elements for seawater and brackish water desalination and for water reuse of potable, non-potable and industrial water.
"The Jubail Operations replicates and builds on the state-of-the-art production technology employed in Edina, Minnesota, and adds a high technology investment to the Kingdom," said Chuck Swartz, president for Dow in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
It is anticipated that RO elements manufactured at the plant have the capability to reduce the oil requirement to distill water in the region by approximately 10 million bbl per year -- equivalent to reducing the greenhouse gas emissions from 900,000 passenger vehicles driven per year.
Dow’s investment in the DW&PS plant complements its continued activities at the Dow Middle East Research and Development Center at King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST), where research on RO solutions in combination with ultrafiltration pretreatment for seawater desalination is taking place.
As MRC informed earlier, DuPont Co. and Dow Chemical Co. said U.S. regulators last week requested additional information about their pending merger, which will extend the their antitrust review. The pending deal, unveiled in December, will combine two of the oldest companies in the U.S. into a chemical giant called DowDuPont, initially valued at about USD130 billion. The combined company will then split itself into three separately-traded companies focused on agricultural products, material sciences, and specialty products about 18 to 24 months after the merger closes.
The Dow Chemical Company is an American multinational chemical corporation. Dow is a large producer of plastics, including polystyrene, polyurethane, polyethylene, polypropylene, and synthetic rubber. In 2014, Dow had annual sales of more than USD58 billion and employed approximately 53,000 people worldwide.
MRC