Egypt Is To Have Styrene Plant At Alexandria Refining Complex.

The Alexandria Petroleum Company (APC), a unit of state-owned Egyptian General Petroleum Corp. (EGPC), is establishing a new venture which will produce styrene and other petrochemicals at its expanding refinery complex. The styrene plant should be on stream by 2001, when local demand for this product would have risen considerably.

The complex is near a propylene plant and polypropylene unit being built for Orient Petrochemicals Company (OPC). A private company, OPC is one of Egypt's leading textiles producers.

The 100,000 b/d APC refinery in Alexandria is being expanded and will have a 17,000 b/d continuous catalytic reformer being built by the Italian unit of Technip of France, under a $170m contract signed in June 1998. The reformer, to turn naphtha into high octane unleaded gasoline, should be ready by early 2000. Other new units at the complex include a lube oil plant, under construction by the French unit of Foster Wheeler and the Alexandria Mineral Oils Co.

A mixed oil products plant, to cost about $80m, will be built at the complex to produce engine grease, petroleum jelly and bitumens. For this plant APC has recently formed the Alexandria Special Petroleum Products Co. (ASPPC), in which it is now holding 30% with the rest held by private interests. Bidders for ASPPC's project include Technip, Tecnicas Reunidas of Spain, Jomo and Niigata of Japan, and a South Korean grouping of Samsung Engineering and Hyundai.