Qatar Petrochemical Co Ltd (Qapco), a joint venture of Industries of Qatar and Total Petrochemicals, has chosen Basell’s “Lupotech T” technology for its new 250,000 tonnes per year (tpy) low density polyethylene at Mesaieed, Qatar, Basell said.

The start-up of the new plant is expected in 2011.
“This is the 50th ‘Lupotech T’ technology licence worldwide and we are very pleased to work together with Qapco in their important expansion project,” Just Jansz, president of Basell’s Technology Business, said at the signing ceremony at Doha.
Key features in the selection of “Lupotech T” technology include low manufacturing costs, fast start-up and grade changes, and a high onstream factor, Basell added.
So far, fourteen “Lupotech T” plants licensed since 2000, with a total of more than 7 million tpy of licensed capacity, the company said.
Eng Mohammed Yousef Al-Mulla, Qapco general manager signed the technology license agreement.
Basell was selected by Qapco after going through the process of international biding and in conformity with technical, contractual and other commercial aspects.
Basell is a global leader in the development and licensing of polypropylene and polyethylene processes.  It is currently one of the largest producers of polypropylene and polyolefin’s products and have manufacturing facilities around the world.
Speaking after the agreement signing, Al-Mulla said: “The investment in LDPE-3 project has been decided by Qapco on the basis of excess ethylene available from Qapco Ethylene Expansion project (EP-2) and also on the basis of additional ethylene likely to be available from Qatofin’s share of ethylene in Ras laffan Cracker of 1.3 million tonnes after feeding the requirement of its LLDPE plant of the capacity of 450KT.”
The LDPE production coming from new plant primarily would be sold in Asia and Europe. The project has its own specific features and economies, he said.
Al- Mulla pointed out that the large scale of LDPE production will be economical to the overall operations, besides increasing the overall revenues and profits of Qapco.
“The LDPE-3 Project is forecast to be completed at the end 2010 with commercial production expected in early 2011.  After the startup of LDPE-3 plant, the total PE capacity of Qapco including Qatofin would increase to approximately 1.2 million tonnes per year comprising of 650-700KT of LDPE and 450KT of LLDPE”, Al-Mulla said.
Jansz said that his company was pleased to sign the technology agreement with Qapco and expressed his hope that such a partnership will be successful and fruitful.
Polyethylene is a thermoplastic material, which is widely used.
Its consumption has increased dramatically in the last few decades. The demand for polyethylene continues to increase globally at a steady pace as it is being utilised worldwide for packaging food, detergents, oil and other products, for making pipes and fittings in the construction industry, for making components widely used in the automobiles sector, and for various usages in agriculture and medical fields.
Qapco and its shareholder partner Total Petrochemicals, France have worked together successfully for more than 25 years selling Qapco’s LDPE products, thanks to its strong advantages of high quality and competitive prices.
Meanwhile, Qapco has participated in 10th Arabplast Exhibition for Plastics and Rubber, which was held in Cairo in March.
Commenting on Plastex 2007, Ahamd Al-Emadi, head of Regional Sales in Marketing Department said that Qapco’s stand welcomed over 150 customers specialised in petrochemicals from more than 15 countries.
The Qapco delegation discussed all marketing matters with customers and answered their queries relating to present and future marketing plans.
The current world prices and high quality products along with plans for increasing sales were also tackled.
In conjunction with Plastex 2007, Radwan Yabroudi, TCS engineer gave a detailed technical presentation on Linear Low Density Polyethylene (LLDPE), which is to be produced by the Qatofin project, expected to be completed at the end of 2008.  The presentation included details about LLDPE grades and applications in the thermoplastics.
All aspects of the plastics industry were covered; data and figures about the production capacity of ethylene in Qatar and the polyethylene sales in the world market.
Throughout the exhibition, some promotional brochures and printing materials were distributed as well as technical pamphlets with data figures about different petrochemical products of the company.
Qapco also held a dinner banquet and a party for all its customers. All matters relating to plastics industry and the anticipated problems were discussed with customers.
Plans for development were also discussed in terms of quality, increase of production and finding new horizons to establish good business relationship with new customers.
Mohd Jassim Al-Na’ama, PR Manager gave a briefing about Qapco saying it has achieved progress and prosperity and talked about the expanded marketing network.
Qapco has accomplished its general shutdown 2007 successfully.
The shutdown was concluded in accordance with the project schedule and plans programmed during the planning phase with zero accident and zero days lost among Qapco staff.
Meanwhile, Qapco officially opened a regional warehouse in Al-Adabia, Egypt, in addition to its liaison office, which was already opened in Cairo in 2002.
Qapco also held its third Marketing Network Gathering in Qatar. Qapco representatives and agents from the local, regional and international markets attended the four-day event.
The forum focussed on various issues ranging from the global petrochemical market developments to Qapco’s expansion projects, ways to achieve optimal performance levels and opportunities to expand the scope of the network, among others.
One of the main highlights of the four-day event was the launch of the new visual identity (logo) and corporate philosophy of Qapco.
Energy Minister and Chairman of Qatar Petroleum and Qapco Board of Directors Abdullah bin Hamad Al Attiyah officially launched the new identity of Qapco.