Page 15 - AsianOil Week 11 2023

AsianOil PROJECTS & COMPANIES AsianOil

Building commences on Shaheen project

SOUTH KOREA A ceremony was held last week in Ulsan, South with progressing its broader carbon neutrality
Korea, to mark the start of work on the $7bn Sha- goal.
The project is worth heen integrated petrochemical plant located in In 2018, S-Oil invested KRW4.8 trillion
$7bn. Onsan Industrial Complex. ($3.7bn) on an expansion project to produce
South Korean major S-Oil Corp. plans to start propylene oxide, propylene and polypropylene
commercial operation of the plant in 2026, and by reprocessing atmospheric residues from
noted that the facility will produce around 3.2mn crude refining.
tonnes per year (tpy) of petrochemical products
including ethylene, propylene benzene and buta- Impact
diene from feedstocks naphtha and off-gas. The new petrochemicals unit is key to the
The plant, Shaheen – the Arabic word for fal- steady strengthening of relations between Saudi
con – is being funded by Saudi Aramco Overseas Arabia and South Korea.
(a subsidiary of Saudi Aramco), which holds a During the ceremony, President Yoon hailed
63.4% stake in S-Oil. The project is Saudi Ara- its potential: “The Shaheen project will help
bia’s largest investment in South Korea to date, boost job creation and the local economy, while
and was finalised during South Korean Presi- further strengthening co-operation between
dent Yoon Suk-yeol’s meeting with Saudi Crown South Korea and Saudi Arabia.”
Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MbS) in Seoul Seoul has recently stepped up co-operation
last November. with Middle Eastern crude producers to improve
The plant will also contain a thermal energy security as the country’s oil refiners repo-
crude-to-chemical (TC2C) facility, which will sition away from sanctioned Russian oil. Korean
convert crude into petrochemical feedstocks National Oil Co. (KNOC) data showed a 21%
such as LPG and naphtha, as well as various increase in Middle Eastern fuel imports from
other facilities such as storage tanks. 2021 and a sharp decline of 61% in flows from
“The giant petrochemical plant will help Russia.
S-Oil diversify its business portfolio from crude Key South Korean government ministries
to chemicals for innovative growth, and will raise such as the Ministry of Trade, Industry and
S-Oil’s petrochemical portion to 25% by 2030 Energy, and the Ministry of Economy and
from the current level of 12%, playing a pivotal Finance also visited Riyadh in February, contin-
role in diversifying its fuel-weighted business.” uing the free trade negotiations with represent-
S-Oil said in a statement. The project also aims to atives from GCC member nations and marking
solidify S-Oil’s move towards becoming a “clean the seventh round of discussions between the
energy and petrochemicals company” along two parties. ™

Week 11 17•March•2023 www. NEWSBASE .com P15