Russia's SIBUR signs design development deal with Linde on West Siberia unit

Russian petrochemicals company SIBUR signed a deal with Germany's Linde for design development of a steam cracker unit at its Zapsibneftechim plant in West Siberia Thursday, during the St Petersburg Economic Forum.

‘‘Linde will be responsible for development of front end engineering design (FEED) documentation and the relevant sections of the overall design package [of the unit],’‘ SIBUR said in a statement after the signing said. The unit has a designed capacity of 1.5 million mt/year of ethylene, and upon completion will become the largest facility of its kind in Russia, the statement said.

SIBUR Chairman of the Board Leonid Mikhelson and Linde CEO Wolfgang Reitzle signed the contracts at a meeting in which SIBUR CEO Dmitry Konov and Linde board member Aldo Belloni also took part.

‘‘We hope that this agreement will lead to further key contracts for our engineering business in this Eastern European growth market,’‘ Belloni said.

SIBUR earlier signed a raft of contracts for work on FEED documentation and design at the Zapsibneftekhim complex, which is expected to have an overall polymer production capacity of 2 million mt.

These include an agreement with Ineos Technologies for four polyethylene production units with a combined annual capacity of 1.5 million mt and a deal with LyondellBassell for a 500,000 mt/year polypropylene production unit.