IRAN - The Bandar Imam Complex.

Located in a northern Gulf port originally known as Bandar Shahpour and after the 1979 revolution called Bandar Khomeini, this venture had begun in the early 1970s. That was when the Pahlavi Shah wanted to industrialise Iran on a large scale and sought strategic partnerships with Japan. Companies in the Mitsui group formed a consortium called Iran Chemical Development Co. (ICDC) to participate in a 50-50% venture with NPC named Iran Japan Petrochemical Company (IJPC). Work on the complex started in 1973 and was 85% complete when the war with Iraq broke out in September 1980. It was to have a capacity of 3.8m t/y but work stopped because of the war. In 1983 it was resumed after Iran agreed to pay off its share of debts run up by IJPC from 1979. However, another Iraqi air raid forced Japanese personnel to pull out early in 1984. They never returned to the site. Iraqi raids in 1984-86 inflicted more damage. In 1989 the Iranian and Japanese partners agreed on a "friendly liquidation" of IJPC, with Mitsui accepting to pay some $930m in compensation. IJPC had invested about [yen]600 bn ($4.3 bn) in the project, much of that borrowed from Japanese and Western banks. Mitsui said in 1989 that added expenditure of some $3 bn was required to complete the complex. After the liquidation of IJPC, the Bandar Khomeini venture was renamed Bandar Imam Complex. Work on repairing and completing the complex got under way in 1990, following the award of a $50m management contract to Technip of France in February of that year, and was to be done in three phases. Preliminary studies and preparation work were carried out by Krupp Koppers of Germany and the Dutch firm Lummus Crest BV under a $30m contract awarded in January 1990. The first phase was completed in March 1991 and consisted of a 1.46m t/y NGL fractionator to yield 500,000 t/y of propane, 450,000 t/y of butane and 191,500 t/y of ethane and other units. Most of the second phase was completed in early August 1994 and consisted of nine units, including a second NGL fractionator identical to the first one, and plants producing ethylene, LDPE, HDPE and propylene. Additional Phase II units were completed in late 1994 to produce VCM, PVC and chlorine. Phase III consisted of an aromatics plant, which started operating in November 1996. The Bandar Imam complex now can produce 1m t/y of aromatics, bringing total capacity to 3.85m t/y. Under the 1995-2000 plan, the Bandar Imam complex is to have a 660,000 t/y MTBE plant, which would be using LPG produced locally and methanol to be produced in Kharg. Whether it will be built in time remains to be seen. Capacity would be raised further with the completion of a 150,000 t/y polyxylene plant and a 307,000 t/y olefins plant. The green light to build the polyxylene unit was given in April 1996. The following are the main units at the Bandar Imam complex, run by Bandar Imam Petrochemical Co., NPC's local subsidiary (capacities in '000 t/y):

LPG                                    2,900
Ethylene dichloride                      310
Low-density polyethylene (LDPE)          100
High-density polyethylene (HDPE)          60
Propylene                                110
Polypropylene                             50
Chlorine                                 230
Vinyl chloride monomer (VCM)             175
Polyvinyl chloride (PVC)                 175
Caustic soda                             260
Acrylonitrile                             50
Hydrochloric acid                         35
Benzene                                  351
Mixed xylene                             144
Styrene butadiene rubber (SBR)            40
Gasoline                                  62

By end-1994, the complex had cost almost $5 bn and NPC had assigned some 10,000 engineers and technicians to the project. Contractors included: Technip, which rebuilt the gas cracking units feeding the whole complex with LPGs and ethane; Daelim of South Korea, given a $150m contract for the ethylene plant; Krupp Koppers of Germany, given $280m contracts for the ethylene, vinyl chloride and PVC/VCM units, in association with Kloeckner; Nissho Iwai of Japan, given a $52.2m contract for the replacement of damaged parts and equipment at the complex; and Tecnimont of Italy for the acrylonitrile units. By 1995 the complex was exporting about 60% of its output to companies from France, Germany and Finland which have helped provide finance for the units under buy-back deals. It was exporting more than 1m t/y of LPG to Japan, South Korea and other Asian countries.