MOSCOW (MRC) -- The British government said that Saudi petrochemical firm Saudi Basic Industries Corp (SABIC), the world's fourth-biggest petrochemicals firm, would invest nearly 1 billion pounds (USD1.37 billion) at its Teesside facility in northeast England with the aim of decarbonisation, reported Reuters.
"Fantastic to see nearly GBP1 billion invested in SABIC's Teesside facility, creating and safeguarding 1,000 jobs," British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said in a tweet on Wednesday evening.
"It's a huge vote of confidence in the UK's chemicals and processing industry, which is pioneering innovation in clean, green technology," he added.
SABIC confirmed the investment in a statement to Reuters and said its total investment in the UK is around 1 billion pounds. The company said the investment would include strengthening operations at Teesside and enabling its chemical cracker transformation.
"This will reduce its carbon footprint by up to 60% in phase one, making it one of the world’s lowest carbon-emitting crackers," it added.
Earlier this month, the UK government set out a net-zero strategy under which it aims to help the country gain a competitive edge in low-carbon technologies such as carbon capture and storage.
As MRC informed earlier, in late September 2021, SABIC said its joint venture project with ExxonMobil in the US Gulf Coast had started commissioning activities and preparing for an initial startup. The project includes the establishment of an ethylene production unit with annual capacity of about 1.8 MMtpy, which will feed two polyethylene (PE) units and a monoethylene glycol (MEG) unit, it said in a statement.
Ethylene and propylene are the main feedstocks for the production of polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP), respectively.
According to MRC's ScanPlast report, Russia's estimated PE consumption totalled 1,638,370 tonnes in the first eight months of 2021, up by 10% year on year. Shipments of all grades of ethylene polymers increased. At the same time, PP shipments to the Russian market were 989,570 tonnes in the first eight months of 2021, up by 30% year on year. Deliveries of homopolymer PP and block-copolymers of propylene (PP block copolymers) increased, whereas shipments of injection moulding PP random copolymers decreased significantly.
Saudi Basic Industries Corporation (SABIC) ranks among the world's top petrochemical companies. The company is among the world's market leaders in the production of polyethylene, polypropylene and other advanced thermoplastics, glycols, methanol and fertilizers.
MRC