Major gas chemical complex commissioned in Uzbekistan

The Ustyurt Gas Chemical Complex, the largest in Central Asia has recently been commissioned in Karakalpakstan. The Prime Ministers of Uzbekistan Shavkat Mirziyoyev and South Korea Hwang Kyo-ahn both officiating at a ribbon-cutting ceremony held on site on May 21, 2016. The project is located approximately 1,300 kilometers (km) from Tashkent on the Ustyurt plateau in the Kungrad region.

The project involved both the upstream development and operations at the Surgil Field involving drilling new production wells and constructing upstream infrastructure including expanding the complex gas treatment unit to supply up to 3 billion cubic meters per annum (BCMA) of gas and 115 thousand tons per annum (KTPA) of condensate; and the downstream development and operations at the gas treatment site is located approx. 115km southwest of the Surgil Field.

The integrated gas to chemical complex production (gas-to-chemical) comprises five plants a gas separation plant, an ethylene, a high-density polyethylene plant, a polypropylene plant, and supporting facilities; product transportation, water supply infrastructure; the project also includes three 35-megawatt gas turbine generator sets so its power supply independent of the national grid.

The project is sourcing gas from its own Surgil Field and will also purchase gas, through a gas supply agreement with UNG, from the Severniy-Berdakh and Vostochniy Berdakh Uchsay fields. Each is currently on-stream and the incremental production of the three gas fields available to the project provides the required gas volume. Condensate supply required for the polymer process is being provided under long-term supply contracts.

The upstream and downstream components of the project  are connected by two parallel 115-km pipelines constructed to supply gas and condensate from the Surgil Field to the gas separation plant. The complex at full production is expected to annually process 4.5 billion cubic meters of natural gas, produce up to 4 billion cubic meters of marketable gas, 387,000 tons of polyethylene, 83,000 tons polypropylene.

A consortium of Korean companies joined Uzbekneftegaz having established the Uz-Kor Gas Chemical joint venture in May, 2008. Ustyurt GCC project was implemented on a parity basis. The Korean consortium included Lotte Chemical 24.5%, Korea Gas Corporation 22.5% and GS E& R 3%. The consortium established a joint venture, the UZ-Kor Gas Chemical LLC, with the Uzbekistan state-run company Uzbekneftegaz 50%. The consortium financed 50 percent of the project, and the Uzbekistan financed the other half to develop the gas chemical complex. The main customers  base likely CIS, Eastern Europe and Turkey and later western regions of China.

General contractors of the project were the Korean Samsung Engineering, GS Engineering and Hyundai Engineering. The construction of the complex began in 2011. The total cost of the project amounting to nearly US $ 4 billion. Participants of the project allocated approximately $1.4 billion and attracted about $2.5 billion from financial institutions in order to implement the project.

Source:http://www.mrcplast.com/news-news_open-318462.html