ONGC places order to the tune of $1.4 bln for new ethylene plant

25-Dec-08

India's Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) has decided to proceed full throttle with its proposed petrochemicals projects at Dahej in Gujarat. ONGC Petro-Additions, a special purpose vehicle set up with Gujarat State Petroleum Corporation has placed orders to the tune of US$1.4 bln with Linde AG of Germany and Samsung Engineering of South Korea, both engineering-construction firms. Samsung Engineering has been awarded the engineering, procurement, construction and commissioning contract for the plant in corsortium with Linde, the international gas and engineering technology group. The South Korean builder will have a share of about Rs 2,350 crore in the order while Linde has secured a share of the rest Rs 2,350 crore. ONGC holds 26% stake in ONGC Petro Additions and 5% is with Gujarat State Petroleum Corporation. State-owned gas utility GAIL India and Petronet LNG (private firm promoted by state-run oil companies for importing gas in ships) are interested in the project. The Rs 13,600 crore project will process gas imported by Petronet for extracting ethane and propane which will then be used to make polymers. Naphtha will come from ONGC's Hazira and Uran land processing plants. The project is slated for successful commissioning by December 2012. The plant will be located in the Special Economic Zone at Dahej in Guajrat with a nameplate capacity to produce about 1,100,000 tpa of ethylene and 340,000 tpa of propylene.