Rainer Dubi new President Services Division at Burckhardt Compression

MOSCOW (MRC) -- The Board of Directors of Burckhardt Compression Holding AG has appointed Rainer Dubi to be the new President of the Services Division and a member of the Executive Board, said Hydrocarbopnprocessing.

The Board of Directors of Burckhardt Compression Holding AG has appointed Rainer Dubi (50) to be the new President of the Services Division and a member of the Executive Board. He will succeed Martin Wendel, who has held this position since September 2016.

Rainer Dubi has been with Burckhardt Compression since 2003 and is highly familiar with the company's reciprocating compressor manufacturing and services business. Rainer Dubi has served as the Head of Design and Manufacturing since 2012 and is a member of the Systems Division management team. Prior to this position, he was a market segment manager for compressor sales and a manager in the Sizing department at Burckhardt Compression.

Rainer Dubi has a mechanical engineering degree from the Winterthur School of Engineering and subsequently obtained a Master Degree in Advanced Studies of Business Administration (MASBA) from the ZHAW School of Management in Winterthur.

Martin Wendel will leave the company at the end of August 2019. He was instrumental in establishing the Services business as a stand-alone division and extending the international reach of our company, for what the Board of Directors and the Executive Board thank him.

Marcel Pawlicek, CEO of Burckhardt Compression Group: “Rainer Dubi has held various management roles during his more than 15 years with Burckhardt Compression. The Services Division will benefit from his broad industry knowledge."
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Chevron USA., a wholly-owned subsidiary of Chevron Corp., has signed a new sales and purchase agreement with GS Caltex Corp. for the delivery of liquefied natural gas (LNG) to South Korea from Chevron's global supply portfolio, according to Apic-online.

GS Caltex, a petrochemicals joint venture of Chevron and GS Energy, will begin receiving LNG in October 2019. Chevron has an existing LNG sales and purchase agreement with GS Caltex, which was executed in 2009.

"We're proud of our partnership with GS Caltex and we welcome this opportunity to build on that relationship by supplying LNG to South Korea's growing market," noted Hugh Connett, president of global gas at Chevron.

As MRC reported earlier, South Korean GS Caltex is planning to invest approximately USD1.8-billion to build a new olefins production plant in Yeosu, South Korea.The project involves construction of the company's first mixed feed cracker, which will have the capacity to produce 700,000 t/y of ethylene and 500,000 t/y of polyethylene. Construction is expected to start this year with operations anticipated to begin in 2022.

GS Caltex is an equally-owned joint venture of GS Holdings and Chevron.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Sasol began production at the first of seven units at its giant Lake Charles chemical plant in the U.S, boosting shares in the South African petrochemical group, reported Reuters.

The plant in Louisiana, which will cut the company’s reliance on fuel, has an expected output of 1.5 million tonnes of ethylene, a chemical used in industries such as packaging, detergents and adhesives.

Sasol, whose main business transforming coal to liquid fuel helped apartheid-era South Africa side-step a 1980s oil embargo, expects the project to add USD1.3 billion to its annual core earnings, or EBITDA, in the 2022 fiscal year.

The company reported core earnings of 46 billion rand (USD3.32 billion) in the 2018 financial year. The capital expenditure on the project could top USD11.8 billion, Sasol said in profit guidance last week.

As MRC wrote previously, in June 2018, Honeywell announced that Secunda Synfuels Operations, an operating division of Sasol South Africa Ltd., will use a Honeywell Connected Plant service to monitor the operating reliability of its two Honeywell UOP CCR Platforming units at its refinery in Secunda, South Africa.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) - Iran has become self-sufficient in gasoline production, Iranian Oil Minister Bijan Zanganeh said after the inauguration of the third phase of the Persian Gulf Star Refinery in the southern port city of Bandar Abbas, as per Hydrocarbonprocessing.

"Fortunately, we do not need to import gasoline anymore. We have reached self-sufficiency. We can export our produced gasoline but have no export plans," Zanganeh was quoted as saying by Iran's state TV.

As MRC informed before, in January 2019, Japanese refiners loaded Iranian oil onto a tanker, resuming imports after halting purchases because of sanctions by the United States. Japan is the last of the four biggest Iranian oil buyers in Asia to resume imports after receiving a waiver from US sanctions on crude imports that started in November. China and India maintained their imports after November while South Korea halted imports for four months, resuming them earlier in January.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- The high-density polyethylene plant was officially opened today within SOCAR Polymer project in the Sumgayit Chemical Industry Park, said Neftegaz.

The opening ceremony was attended by the President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev, SOCAR senior officials and representatives of the companies involved in the construction of SOCAR Polymer plants.

According to preliminary plans, SOCAR Polymer plants will produce 184,000 tons of 10 varieties of polypropylene and 120,000 tons of 4 high-density polyethylene varieties. During the operation period, the plants are expected to bring $6.6 billion revenues, 30 % of which will be the company's net profit.

In addition, SOCAR Polymer is expected to pay a total of $600 million taxes to the state budget. The high-density polyethylene is still an imported product in the country, but now SOCAR's new industrial complex will fully meet the demand of the domestic market and export the remaining 75% of the product to the Turkish and European markets.

In his report to the head of state, President of SOCAR Rovnag Abdullayev said: "About 3,500 people have been involved in the construction of SOCAR Polymer plants. 500 permanent workers will be employed during their operation. Maximum safety requirements were observed and over 18.5 million man-hours of work have been achieved accident-free. According to preliminary estimates, SOCAR Polymer complex at its full capacity will increase the export revenues of the country's non-oil sector by 18% and gross domestic product of the Absheron economic region by 14%."

SOCAR Polymer is the 1st petrochemical company in Azerbaijan based on a public-private partnership. Shareholders of SOCAR Polymer are SOCAR (52.2%), Vitol (19%), Pasha Holding (9,9%), Ecoland (9.8%), Polymer Investments (5%) and AKKIK (4.1%). About 60% of the project cost was paid by the loans of Russian Gazprombank.

SOCAR Polymer was founded in 2013 to accelerate the chemical industry development in Azerbaijan. The foundation of SOCAR Polymer plants based on advanced technologies was laid on October 25, 2015. The polypropylene plant under SOCAR Polymer was opened on July 18, 2018. The polypropylene plant’s 1st export product was delivered to Turkey last October.
MRC