Iran’s 1,500 km long West Ethylene Pipeline is expected to go operational by the end of the current Iranian calendar year (March 20, 2015), said Managing director of Iran's National Petrochemical Company (NPC) Abbas Sheri Moqqadm, reports FARS News Agency.
According to the NPC official, the NPC is giving priority to completion of underway petrochemical projects, and the West Ethylene Pipeline, which would meet feedstock requirements of petrochemical plants located in the western part of the country, will begin operations by 2015.
Mr. Moqqadm also informed that the second phase of the Kavian Petrochemical Plant, which forms part of the world’s biggest petrochemical complex in Asalouyeh, is also expected to go operational by the end of the current calendar year.
Once the second phase of the Kavian Petrochemical Plant begins operations, the plant would be able to supply feedstock to other petrochemical plants located on route of the West Ethylene Pipeline, he added.
Currently, Kavian Petrochemicals fetches ethane from phases 4, 5, 9 and 10 of South Pars gas field, as phases 15-8 of South Pars are still under construction. On completion of the second phase, Kavian would be able to inject more ethylene to West Ethylene Pipeline. Kavian Petrochemical Plant houses capacity to process 2.58 million tons of feedstock to produce 2 million tons of ethylene per annum.
The West Ethylene Pipeline, construction of which began in 2002, is considered to be the longest ethylene transfer pipeline in the world, stretching from Assaluyeh in southern Iran, to West Azarbaijan province in north-western Iran.
The pipeline is structured to transfer 150,000 tons of ethylene to Tbriz Petrochemical Plant. It would also cater to feedstock requirements of Lorestan, Mahabad and Kurdestan petrochemical plants.
Around 14 petrochemical plants, which are either operational or being constructed with an investment of US$ 8.5 billion, lie on the route of the pipeline, which would pass through 11 provinces in the country such as Fars, Khuzestan, Lorestan, Kohguiluyeh Boyer Ahmad, Chahar Mahal va Bakhtiari, Kurdstan, Kermanshah, Ilam, Hamedan, East Azarbaijan and West Azarbaijan.