Riyadh – Mubasher: Following the recent announcement the Saudi Aramco has entered into a $20 billion joint venture with the Saudi Basic Industries Corp (SABIC) to convert oil into chemicals, the world’s largest oil company’s CEO revealed that more projects in the field were underway.
On Sunday, Saudi Arabian Oil Co, globally known as Saudi Aramco, had announced signing a preliminary agreement with SABIC to build a petrochemicals complex with operations to begin in 2025.
“We are looking at chemicals as a very attractive market for diversification,” Reuters reported citing Aramco CEO Amin Nasser as saying.
“It’s a starting point, there will be others in the future as we develop our technologies to shift or turn more barrels of crude into chemicals,” Nasser added during an interview after signing the SABIC deal.
Aramco has been taking steps to develop its various business segments ahead of a highly-anticipated initial public offering (IPO) for 5% of its shares. Its PO is slated for 2018 and talks with global bourses are ongoing.
The Saudi oil firm will begin piloting technologies that should turn between 70% and 80% of its crude oil intake into chemicals, the top official revealed, noting that demand for petrochemicals is set to grow at a quicker pace than crude.
“Demand in the petrochemicals sector is twice as much as the transport sector so for us it is very important as a strategy to look at other sectors and maximise the value of our resources such as converting crude directly into chemicals,” he stated.
Saudi Aramco’s crude is mostly used in the transport sector, followed by aviation, shipping and a number of other sectors, the CEO said.
Aramco will not need to raise production beyond its current capacity as it has “ample spare capacity to accommodate this and other projects,” the top official said in a comment on whether or not the company would need to increase its production on the back of the petrochemicals expansion.
He further indicated that Aramco’s plans to bolster production at fields, such as Marjan, Zuluf, Berri, is to maintain production capacity.
