CPChem picks Sweeny site for new US PE plants, awards engineering to Jacobs
Chevron Phillips Chemical (CPChem) said Monday that the two polyethylene (PE) facilities planned as part of the company’s US Gulf Coast (USGC) petrochemical project will be located on a site near the Sweeny facility in Old Ocean, Texas.
“These polyethylene facilities would be the first ethylene derivative units to be constructed in Old Ocean and as such, they offer an exciting opportunity to our employees, the surrounding Brazoria County community, and those businesses that would service these new facilities,” said Peter L. Cella, CEO.
“In addition, constructing polyethylene infrastructure at Old Ocean better positions the location for potential future investments.”
In March 2011, Chevron Phillips Chemical announced that would pursue a project to construct a world-scale ethane cracker and ethylene derivatives facilities in the USGC region.
The two new polyethylene facilities will each have a capacity of 500,000 tpy (1.1 billion pounds) and utilize Chevron Phillips Chemical’s proprietary Loop Slurry Technology.
Chevron Phillips Chemical said it had reached a front-end engineering and design (FEED) agreement with Jacobs Engineering Group to design the polyethylene facilities.
Financial terms were not disclosed.
The company also announced Monday that it had reached an agreement with Shaw Energy & Chemicals to design the previously-announced 1.5 million tpy (3.3 billion pounds/year) ethane cracker to be built at the company’s existing Cedar Bayou facility in Baytown, Texas.
“The significant steps taken since our initial announcement of a feasibility study only one year ago reflect a strong endorsement of the USGC Petrochemicals Project by Chevron Phillips Chemical’s owners and management,” said Cella.
“We continue to believe that synergy with our existing Gulf Coast operations, proximity to feedstock supply, and application of proprietary technologies uniquely positions our company to capitalize on the opportunity that development of abundant shale resources affords the United States, and in particular the Gulf Coast region,” he continued.
“This project would benefit our owners, employees, local communities, customers, and suppliers.”
In total, the company’s US Gulf petrochemical project is expected to create approximately 400 long-term direct jobs and 10,000 engineering and construction jobs, officials said.
The estimated completion date for all project work is 2017.
Chevron Phillips Chemical is jointly owned by Chevron and Phillips 66, the downstream spinoff of ConocoPhillips.
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