IOC's Petrochemicals Group includes five sub-groups classified by product and function -- linear alkyl benzene, purified terephthalic acid, polymers, logistics and exports.
IOC also owns Asia's largest polymer warehouse at Panipat, which has 15 online bagging and palletizing machines, each with a capacity of 1,200 bags/hour, and 50 loading bays with fork-lift operations. The warehouse will handle a large number of polymer grades that will supply the plastics processors industry across 327 districts in India.
The company has earmarked Rupees 300 billion ($6.8 billion) investments over 2007-2012 in world-class plants and country-wide marketing infrastructure, the statement said. These plants are designed to use product streams from IOC's refineries, to produce a wide range of value-added
petrochemical products and intermediates for segments such as detergents, polyesters and polymers or plastics.
India's domestic petrochemicals industry has grown at a rate of 13-15% in the last two decades, the company added. IOC's PTA sales in particular, rose to 528,000 mt/year in 2009-2010, 30% higher year on year, the statement said.
IOC further projects a turnover of Rupees 180 billion from its petrochemicals business by the year 2011-2012.
In 2010, IOC brought on stream its new petrochemical complex at Panipat. The Panipat complex includes a naphtha-fed steam cracker that can produce 650,000 mt/year of propylene and 800,000 mt/year of ethylene. Downstream from the cracker is a 600,000 mt/year polypropylene plant, a 300,000 mt/year high density polyethylene plant, a 350,000 mt/year HDPE/linear low density
polyethylene swing plant and a 300,000 mt/year monoethylene glycol plant.
IOC is setting up a petrochemicals complex at its upcoming grassroots refinery at Paradip in Orissa. To be commissioned by 2011-2012, the 15 million mt/year refinery will include downstream petrochemical facilities of paraxylene, polypropylene, styrene and India's first styrene-butadiene-rubber unit, a joint venture with Taiwan's TSRC and Japan's Marubeni.
The 120,000 mt/year SBR plant is estimated to cost of Rupees 9 billion and is slated for completion by September 2012.
China Chemical Weekly: http://news.chemnet.com/en/detail-1411716.html
