Private sector to play bigger role in Iran's 3rd petchem leap: official

Addressing a ceremony marking the official launch of Phase 2 of Takht Jamshid Petrochemical Plant on Tuesday, Behzad Mohammadi said the project was one of the first plants to be launched in the second leap of the industry in Iran which will bring the country’s petrochemical production capacity to 100 mt/y by 2022 from currently 66 mt/y.

Mohammadi, who is also deputy petroleum minister for petrochemical affairs, said the third leap of the industry would come to fruition in a 5-year time span and would bring the country’s petrochemical production capacity to 133 mt/y.

Moreover, Iran’s petrochemical revenues would reach 37 billion dollars per year, according to SHANA.

The official went on to say that 16 catalyst groups had so far been localized in the petrochemical industry, adding the presence of the private sector in the third leap would be 4 times more than the projects of the second leap.  

The NPC CEO, pointing out that one of the concerns of the petrochemical industry in the country was the transition from natural gas to methanol as well as acquiring the technical savvy of PVM which had been carried out by the Petrochemical Research and Technology Company (PRTC), stated, “This project will be commissioned by 2021 in West Islamabad with $550 million investment and in three segments of gas into methanol, methanol to propylene and propylene to polypropylene and its derivatives.”

Referring to the $33.5 billion catalyst market worldwide, Mohammadi said, 54% of this market is related to the petrochemical and refining industries, adding that the country's catalyst market is $400 to $450 billion, of which $250 million is in the petrochemical industry.

He stated that of the 40 catalytic groups of the petrochemical industry, 16 groups have been localized in Iran, and said that 9 other groups will be commercialized by the end of the calendar year of 1400 (March 2022) and the rest are in research and development phase.

Elsewhere in his address, Mohammadi said Iran’s production capacity for base petrochemical products was 23 million tons which would reach 55 mt/y by 2025. He also added that Saudi Arabia’s production of the items would reach 43 mt/y by 2025.

MNA/SHANA