Construction is ramping up in the Rabigh Refining and Petrochemical Co. (PETRORabigh) project as equipment shipments arrive from all over the world to the growing seaport and industrial hub. The 10,400-ton freighter, the Giga Trans, arrived recently with 8,600 tons of vessels, drums and heat exchangers for the Olefin Plants Project under construction by contractor JGC Corp. The arrival marked the first seaborne delivery to the port at its new jetty. The freighter was piloted to its berth within an hour and cleared all customs checks without event. It took the 130-meter-long ship about 29 days to make the voyage from Masan Port in Korea to its Red Sea destination. Six more ships were scheduled to offload more construction equipment at Rabigh during November alone, according to a report carried by Saudi Aramco's web-site. The Olefin Plants Project includes a high olefin fluid catalytic cracker (HOFCC) and ethane cracker facility. The HOFCC has a minimum design throughput of 92,000 barrels per day of hydro treated vacuum gas-oil and a propylene production capacity of 900,000 tons annually. The ethane cracking unit's design capacity is 1.5 million tons annually of polymer grade ethylene, primarily from pipeline ethane. The facilities are part of the mega-complex being developed by PETRORabigh at Rabigh Refinery scheduled for startup before the fourth quarter of 2008.
