Dubai, UAE — Saudi energy giant Aramco broke ground for its 26.25-billion-riyal ($7 billion) Shaheen Petrochemical Project, its biggest in South Korea.
The groundbreaking was carried out through Aramco’s affiliate S-Oil in South Korea’s industrial city of Ulsan.
Scheduled for completion by 2026, the Shaheen project is aimed at converting crude oil into petrochemical feedstock.
With an annual production capacity of up to 3.2 million tons, the project is the first large-scale commercial use of Saudi Aramco’s crude oil into thermal cracking chemicals, a technology that was initially invented, developed and patented by researchers in Saudi Arabia and later developed on a larger scale by Saudi Aramco in collaboration with Lumos Technologies.
South Korea’s President Yoon Suk Yul participated today in the groundbreaking ceremony, which was also attended by Aramco President and CEO Amin Nasser.
“Shaheen is among Aramco’s biggest international downstream investments, representing a significant and sizeable step forward in our liquids-to-chemicals expansion and another major milestone in further strengthening our presence in Korea,” Nasser said.
