Tobolsk Holds Public Hearing on Plans for Polypropylene Plant

The Tobolsk City Duma today held a public hearing to discuss plans by Tobolsk-Polimer LLC (a SIBUR company) to build a 500,000 tpa polypropylene plant and to review the project’s Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA).

The impact assessment was compiled by Russian consultancy Branan Environment, which specializes in environmental protection planning work. The information required for the discussion was made available to stakeholders through the community liaison office of Tobolsk city and published on the SIBUR website.

The hearing included discussions of two reports: one by the General Director of Tobolsk-Polimer LLC, Mikhail Shperkin, on the polypropylene plant construction plans; and one by Branan Environment manager Aleksey Mingareev on the plant’s EIA.

The discussion concluded with the assembled public representatives voicing their approval of the EIA for construction of the new plant at an industrial site in Tobolsk.

The organizational group was instructed to summarize the questions, comments and proposals made, and to draw up recommendations for the final EIA document.

For Editors

In April 2006, SIBUR set up a fully-owned subsidiary called Tobolsk-Polimer LLC to construct a new polypropylene plant using propane dehydrogenation technology in Tobolsk, Tyumen Region. In January 2007, SIBUR selected Fluor as the project manager.

In February 2007, SIBUR signed an agreement with the Government of Tyumen Region on the joint construction of housing, part of which is intended for employees of the new plant. Work is now underway on Phase 1, comprising two 12-floor units scheduled for completion in June 2008.

In August 2007, SIBUR and project manager FLUOR jointly selected licensed technologies for the project following a detailed feasibility study: US-based UOP will supply the propane dehydrogenation technology, and the polypropylene production technology will come from UK-based INEOS.

In August 2007, the Government of Tyumen Region and Tobolsk-Polimer LLC signed an investment agreement granting state support to the project.