Saudi Basic Industries Corporation (Sabic) has said a $2.6 billion expansion project at its joint venture Yanpet petrochemical complex in Yanbu has come on stream. A Sabic statement said the expansion added to its output capacity 420,000 tonnes per year (tpy) of ethylene glycol, 535,000 tpy of polyethylene, 260,000 tpy of polypropylene and 125,000 of pyrolysis gasoline as well as 800,000 tpy of ethylene cracker. Yanpet is a joint venture between Sabic and ExxonMobil.

ExxonMobil said recently it had completed expanding the Yanpet complex, making it the world's largest polyethylene plant.

"Trial production began late last year and commercial production began in early 2001," the Sabic statement said, adding "the plants have been operating at 100 per cent capacity".

Sabic's Polymers Group President Fahad Al-Sheaibi said Yanpet's new capacity was vital to increasing Sabic's total annual production capacity to 35 million tpy this year, from around 28 million tpy in 2000.

"It significantly strengthens Sabic's position in the global markets for polyethylene, polypropylene and ethylene glycol," he added. Sabic is implementing programmes to increase its annual capacity to 48 million tonnes by 2010. In January, ExxonMobil and Sabic completed a $1 billion expansion of their joint venture Kemya petrochemical plant on Saudi Arabia's eastern coast.

Kemya and Yanpet are part of ExxonMobil Chemical's $5 billion worldwide capital investment programme.