The mammoth Sadara complex at Al Jubail Industrial City II, Saudi Arabia, has started up its mixed feed cracker, which will form the core for the $20 billion project operated by a joint venture of Saudi Aramco and Dow Chemical. Of the 26 manufacturing units in the chemical complex claimed to be the world’s largest ever built in a single phase, 14 will manufacture products completely new to Saudi Arabia.

Using technology licensed from French engineering conrtractor Technip, the cracker with a capacity of 1.5 million t/y of ethylene and 400,000 t/y per year of propylene comprises 12 cracking furnaces, including seven designed to crack ethane gas and the remaining five  naphtha. Three of the five liquid furnaces are capable of switching between gas and liquid feedstock, allowing the company to take advantage of the best available option.

As the first production unit to start up, a 375,000 t/y LLDPE plant using Dow’s technology went on stream in December 2015. A second 375,000 t/y LLDPE plant and a 350,000 t/y LDPE plant – both using Dow’s technology – will also be part of the plastics segment of the complex, in which other units will produce PP, polyurethane feedstocks MDI and TDI and polyolefin elastomers.

“The mixed-feed cracker is the heart of the Sadara chemical complex, and the single-most important component that underpins our vision to be a game changer within the local and regional chemical industry,” said Sadara CEO Ziad al-Labban, adding that it allows the company to produce its own basic chemicals on-site and convert them into a wide range of value-added plastics and specialty chemicals.

Al-Labban said Sadara’s output “will help fill a significant gap” in a regional chemical industry dominated by commodity products, where less than 1% of petrochemical production is currently defined as specialty chemicals.