UAE plastics manufacturer Abu Dhabi Polymers Company (Borouge) has awarded the Linde Group a contract worth $1.075 billion to build another 1.5 million tonnes per year ethane cracker at its Borouge-3 production site in Ruwais, Abu Dhabi.

Borouge also awarded three main contracts for the front end engineering and design (Feed) stage of its Borouge 3 expansion to Tecnimont (Maire Tecnimont Group).
Commenting on the contract with the Linde Group, Abdulaziz Alhajri, CEO of Borouge, said: “The awarding of this contract confirms Borouge’s commitment to Borouge 3, a major expansion of our production facility in Ruwais, which will increase the total capacity of the plant to 4.5 million tonnes of polyolefins annually by the end of 2013.”
In addition to the ethane cracker, the expansion includes the construction of second-generation Borstar polypropylene and polyethylene units, a low density polyethylene unit and a butene unit, as well as related off-site utilities and marine facilities.
“Nowhere else in the world has a petrochemical company installed so much olefins capacity in such a short time as Borouge is currently doing in Abu Dhabi,” said Dr Aldo Belloni, member of the Linde AG executive board.
“We at Linde Engineering are proud to be the supplier of ethylene technology for the Ruwais complex. Our relationship with Adnoc, enriched by our gases joint venture Elixier, and Borealis is now stronger than ever, thus making the Linde Group the leading gases and engineering company in the Middle East.”
The contract will be executed on a lump sum turnkey basis whereby the construction work will be executed by the Consolidated Contractors Company. The new cracker, the third of its kind to be built by the Linde Group for Borouge in one decade, complements the 600,000 tpy and 1.5 million tpy ethane crackers, the latter of which is currently under construction as part of the plant’s expansion from 600,000 to 2 million tpy of polyolefins by mid-2010 and ultimately 4.5 million tonnes of polyolefins annually by 2013.
After completion of the new cracker, Borouge will have the world’s largest ethane cracker complex, setting a new benchmark for the industry.
Borouge is a joint venture between Adnoc, one of the world’s largest oil and gas companies, and Borealis, a leading provider of chemical and innovative plastics solutions.
“The awarding of the contract is a major milestone in the company’s growth strategy in the infrastructure, automotive and advanced packaging markets in the Middle East and Asia, and is an important step in the development of the Abu Dhabi petrochemicals landscape,” a Borouge spokesman said.
As well as Alhajri, officials present at the signing ceremony were Rashed Saud Al Shamsi, Adnoc petrochemicals director; Werner Schwarzmeier, managing director, and Thomas Gruner, executive vice president for olefins plants, Linde AG Engineering; Uwe Rathmann, managing director, Linde Engineering Middle East, and Abdulla N Ateya, vice president, Borouge-3.

Tecnimont contract
The Tecnimont contract includes the Feed of the multiple polyolefin units, the LDPE (low density polyethylene) unit and the utilities and offsite facilities. This development follows the recent selection of Bechtel as the project management support for Borouge 3. The Feed stage will have a duration of approximately nine months.
Tecnimont is an international EPC contractor operating in chemicals and petrochemicals, oil and gas, power, civil engineering and infrastructure.