Azerbaijan to launch new gas processing, petrochemical plants in 2020

/AzerNews/

By Gulgiz Dadashova

Azerbaijan will commission two new gas processing and petrochemical plants, being built under the new Oil and Gas Processing and Petrochemical Complex (OGPC), in early and late 2020, respectively.

OGPC Organization and Control Department Director Orkhan Jafarov made the remark at the 2nd Azerbaijan and Caspian Sea Oil and Gas Week 2014 kicked off in Baku on November 20.

He said raw material for a gas processing plant will be provided from the Azeri-Chirag-Guneshli, Umid and also other fields developed by Azerbaijan’s state energy company independently.

Jafarov went on to say that goods that will be produced at the new petrochemical plant will be used to meet the needs of the country, as well as for export.

The OGPU project envisions construction of a petrochemical enterprise with a capacity of 1.7 million tons of finished products, an oil refinery with a capacity of 10 million tons per year as well as a gas processing plant with a capacity of 10 billion cubic meters per year.

The cost of the project, determined based on a feasibility study, amounts to $17.1 billion, including accrued interest on loans received during the construction work.

The plant is expected to produce around 3 million tons of petrol and nearly 3.6 million tons of diesel fuel per year at the OGPU. The products will meet the Euro-5 standard. In addition, it is planned to produce A-1 jet engine fuel (about 1.7 million tons) which complies with the advanced Western standards, and other oil products. Moreover, in order to create an additional value, it is envisaged to produce nearly 1.7 million tons of export-oriented petrochemical products.

Meanwhile, around 85-90 percent of the total volume of polyethylene (about 880,000 tons per year), polypropylene (around 780,000 tons per year) and butadiene (about 80,000 tons per year), which are expected to be produced in the petrochemical plant will be exported to the Turkish, as well as to European and Asian markets.

Currently, oil products are produced at two Baku refineries with a total capacity of 20 million tons of oil a year. Both refineries are part of SOCAR, which alone processes about 6 million tons of oil from onshore and offshore fields each year.

Around 4.8 million tons of petroleum products were delivered to the Azerbaijani market in 2012, 8.8 percent more than in 2011.