Extracts from Russian Petrochemical Project Quarterly
SIBUR-Far East
SIBUR is not only concentrating on projects in the western parts of Russia but is looking eastwards to a number of locations for possible investment. In the Russian Far East, SIBUR is considering participation in the construction of a gas processing plant and petrochemical complex in the Vladivostok region. This would consist of processing gas through the pipeline Yakutia-Khabarovsk-Vladivostok, which is under construction. The Yakutia-Khabarovsk-Vladivostok pipeline is a planned natural gas pipeline in East Siberia to transport Yakutia gas to Primorsk Kray and Far East countries. The gas complex would be based on a resource base of 25 billion cubic metres of gas from the Chayanda deposit in Yakutia, owned and developed by Gazprom. Ethane and LPGs would be available which would allow the construction of a petrochemical complex.
Plans have been submitted to the Russian government, but whether they will materialise will be determined by decisions on the preparation and transportation of gas from the Chayanda field and arrangements for the commercial terms of exports. Oil production at Chayanda is set to begin in 2014, and gas two years later in 2016. Gas pipeline planned to transport the Yakutia-Khabarovsk-Vladivostok, for which construction is expected to begin in 2012. Recoverable reserves Chayanda field have been estimated at 1.3 trillion cubic metres gas.
Various options are being considered for a petrochemical complex in the Irkutsk region, which could include both Sayanskkhimplast and Gazprom. Under the government of the Irkutsk region, a working group is being set up to consider the establishment of gas-chemical complex in the region. The task of the working group is to identify the best options and direction of the complex.
The Kovytka issue, that was preventing the project from progressing, was resolved last year with Gazprom paying TNK-BP $770 million for the licence to the gas condensate field. Effectively, it remains a question over whether Sayansk is the best location and which is the best source of feedstock. For the past decade Sayanskkhimplast has been considering how to extract ethane from the Kovytka gas condensate field, but complications over the ownership of the field have prevented progress on constructing the gas processing facilities. Kovytka is the not the only source of potential feedstock in the Irkutsk Oblast as the Chikanskoye field also can offer some large reserves of C2 feedstocks, but is not sufficient alone to justify the investment. Another option is that SIBUR could construct a gas processing field to process associated gas from a Rosneft controlled oil field 600 km from Sayansk. However, Rosneft is not keen on assisting measures that eventually may lead to Sayanskkhimplast producing its own ethylene and eliminating its dependency on Angarsk Polymer Plant which is controlled by Rosneft.
According to calculations made by Sayanskkhimplast, the extraction of ethane and other hydrocarbons from 24 billion cubic metres of Kovytka gas could yield 1.4 million tpa of ethylene and producing more than 2 million tpa of various polymers. Certainly Angarsk Polymer Plant lacks the capacity to deal with such feedstocks and there would be a need to construct new facilities
During the processing of this amount will be available 3-3.5 million tons of ethylene and other hydrocarbons, and on this basis to develop 4-5 million tons various chemical products. In this case, the hydrocarbon would be sufficient for additional production of polymers and the development of Angarsk plant in Usolye. Moreover, the use of such a large number of hydrocarbons will be already beyond the capacity of the Angarsk-Usolye-Sayansk complex both on environmental requirements and due to the excessive concentration of production scale. Therefore, a need for construction of at least one more large chemical plant, which produces a wide range of polymers.
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