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Boston, MA -- (SBWire) -- 01/08/2014 --Saudi Arabia's petrochemicals sector will continue to play a central role in the development of the country's non-oil industrial sector, helping to balance an ongoing decline in oil production, according to BMI's Saudi Arabia Petrochemicals Report for Q114. However, the export-orientated sector's vulnerability to the external market, a situation made worse by an overwhelming focus on basic chemicals, is beginning to erode margins as Asian demand growth weakens.

The Saudi petrochemicals industry is not expected to see a massive rise in overall petrochemicals capacities until 2016, when the Sadara Petrochemicals complex is due onstream; the facility is to comprise a cracker with capacity for 1.5mn tonnes per annum (tpa) of ethylene. In 2014, the most notable development will be Arabian Industrial Fibre Company's (Ibn Rushd) 420,000tpa polyethylene terephthalate (PET) plant, which is expected to begin production in Q114. The company is also due to expand the capacities of its upstream paraxylene and PTA plants, which are also located in Yanbu. After debottlenecking, the PX capacity will double, to 400,000 tpa, while the PTA capacity will increase to 700,000tpa. Alrajhi Group's new complex is also due to come onstream in 2014, which includes 100,000tpa of linear alkyl benzene (LAB) and 6,000tpa of polysilicon.

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The development of these intermediates should boost supplies to downstream plants in the Kingdom as well as external markets. PET is used in the production of plastic bottles and polyester fibres, with consumption growth being led by Asian emerging markets. LAB is mostly used as a surfactant, and polysilicon is used in the manufacture of solar panel cells, a sector that is being heavily invested in in the Arabian Gulf.

Key trends and developments in Saudi Arabia's petrochemicals sector:

- Access to plentiful cheap feedstock is likely to change as the government embarks on a phased increase in the price of gas sold to domestic industrial users, in addition to reducing the discount that is currently applied to propane prices. Severe feedstock shortages are expected by the end of the forecast period, at a time when Saudi production will be in competition with petrochemicals produced from cheap US shale gas. However, the country will remain a leading petrochemicals exporter, and providing the Asian market continues on the expected trend, will help absorb the surge in petrochemicals and plastics.

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