Gachsaran petchem project to sell $300m by March
An official with the Persian Gulf Petrochemical Industries Company (PGPIC) in southwestern Iran said the Gachsaran Petrochemical Complex was tasked with using up to half its current capacity, from October 23, 2023, to March 20, 2024, to produce Ethylene and C3+, the sale of which would net the company approximately $300 million.
Hassan Neshanzadeh Moghaddam, the PGPIC deputy CEO for planning and business development, noted that the complex can produce a million tons of Ethylene and 83,000 tons of C3+ annually. The output is achieved by getting the required water from the Kosar Dam in Gachsaran County and receiving 1.25 billion tons of feedstock from the Persian Gulf Bidboland Gas Refinery through a 90-kilometer-long pipe.
Making the remarks at a press conference on Monday, he announced that the Olefin project of the Gachsaran Petrochemical Company is set to go on stream and expressed readiness to hold the launch ceremony after 19 years.
Gachsaran Petrochemical Complex was one of the half-finished projects whose implementation has accelerated over the past two years. The project’s implementation started in 2013, and its completion has always been one of the concerns of PGPIC.
Neshanzadeh Moghaddam cited frequent changes in the compositions of shareholders and board members, occasional shortages of funds, and sanctions as challenges that haunted the project in the last five years and delayed its launch.
The official said the Gachsaran Petrochemical Project was developed to complete the value chain from associated petroleum gases in the petrochemical industry, prevent the sale of raw natural resources, and feed its downstream complexes such as those in Mamasani, Dehdasht, Borujen, Kazerun, and Gachsaran polymer plant.
Dubbing the project the supplier of the “Most Iranian Olefin,” he highlighted that 83 percent of the project’s needs in various areas of mechanics, power, catalyst supply, chemical materials, and equipment were met domestically.
“This is also the first olefin unit, the furnace burner of which has been constructed in Iran,” he added.
Furthermore, Neshanzadeh Moghaddam pointed out, the project will employ approximately a thousand people directly, and up to three thousand people indirectly after it goes online.
He announced that a deal has also been signed to export the ethylene produced by the Gachsaran Petrochemical Complex.
The PGPIC deputy CEO reported a one-million-ton increase year-on-year in the output of the company in the previous Iranian calendar year (to March 20, 2023), reaching $920 million.
He mentioned the Persian Gulf Hoveyzeh Gas Refinery as another half-finished project of the PGPIC that was finally inaugurated earlier this Iranian year and, now, supplies the C5+ of Ilam Petrochemical Company as well as 25–30 tons of feedstock to Bandar Imam Petrochemical Company.