Unusually high volume of naphtha exports by KPC likely due to delay in start up of aromatics plant

16-Apr-09

Kuwait Petroleum Corp (KPC) has offered another naphtha cargo for May, the third this month. This brings total spot exports for next month to an unusually high 150,000 tons. This could possibly be because of a delay in the aromatics plant. The aromatics plant, with feedstock requirement of 1.5 mln tons of naphtha, was scheduled to come on stream in Q2, but seems to have been delayed. KPC, Asia's second-largest term naphtha supplier after Saudi Aramco, does not usually sell spot parcels due to its term commitments, and has been reducing term volumes last year because they needed to feed the plant.