The recent news from Platts is that Oil and Natural Gas Corp (ONGC) will be postponing the Mangalore aromatics plant. What was due to commence commercial operations in March 2014 will now be pushed back until at least Q3 and this is part of a worrying trend across the industry lately.
India’s state-owned Oil and Natural Gas Corp has deferred the startup of its new aromatics plant in Mangalore to the third quarter of 2014, from its previous schedule in March, sources close to the company said Wednesday.
The plant is designed to produce 900,000 mt/year of paraxylene and 270,000 mt/year of benzene.
This is not the first time ONGC has deferred the startup of the plant.
ONGC had initially planned to start commercial operations in April 2013, but this was pushed back several times due to delays in construction.
Other than ONGC, several new PX plants across the region have also recently pushed back their startup dates to later this year.
Saudi Aramco Total Refining and Petrochemical Co., or Satorp, has delayed the startup of its new aromatics plant in Jubail to June-July, from February.
The aromatics plant has a production capacity of 700,000 mt/year of paraxylene and 140,000 mt/year of benzene.
In South Korea, progress on SK Innovation’s new 1.3 million mt/year PX plant in Incheon has been delayed slightly. The company had planned to bring the plant onstream in June or July, but construction works are now seen delayed because of an order from local authorities to halt work.
The Seo-gu district office has determined that the site area of the plant has exceeded what was permitted by city authorities.
By Fumiko Dobashi and edited by Irene Tang of Platts.
The full article is visible via the link below – Pankaj Oswal
Pankaj Oswal 