Uzbekistan, Tashkent, May 17 /Trend D.Azizov/
Technip will complete the preliminary feasibility study for the construction of a synthetic liquid fuels plant GTL in Uzbekistan in January 2013, chief engineer at Technip's office in Rome.
Simon Bonetti said at the Oil and Gas of Uzbekistan international conference on Wednesday.
Bonetti said the company completed a feasibility study for the first phase (Feed1) in 2010, and is currently working on a second phase (Feed2) of a pre-feasibility study.
Uzbekneftegaz, South African Sasol Synfuels International (Pty) Ltd. (Sasol) and Malaysia's Petronas International Corporation Ltd. (Petronas) signed a tripartite investment agreement in November 2009 a to design and build a plant to produce synthetic liquid fuels (GTL)-based at Shurtan MCC (Kashkadarya) at a preliminary cost of $2.739 billion.
In accordance with the terms of the memorandum of association, the joint venture was established in the form of a limited liability company on a parity basis (33.3 per cent) with an initial size of the authorised capital of $30 million, which is to be brought up to $840 million within the investment period.
The plant is expected to refine 3.5 billion cubic meters of gas and produce 672,000 tons of diesel oil, 278 tons of jet fuel, 361,000 tons of naphtha and 63,000 tons of liquefied gas.
Licensor of technology of the production of synthetic liquid fuels (Sasol SPDTM process) within the framework of the project is Sasol Technology (Pty) Ltd.
The raw material for fuel production will be the methane coming from Shurtan of 3.5 billion cubic meters.
The project will be financed with the funds of Petronas, Sasol and Uzbekneftegaz, as well as a consortium of banks and financial institutions providing loans to the joint venture in terms of project funding of up to $ 1.899 billion (70 per cent of the project).
In December 2010, Uzbekneftegaz reported that the estimated capacity of the plant will be increased to 1.468 million tons per year. In June 2011, Petronas decided to reduce its stake in the joint venture Uzbekistan GTL from 33.3 to 11 per cent. In September 2011, the share of Malaysian companies in the joint venture is reduced to 11 per cent share of Sasol and Uzbekneftegaz is now at 44.5 per cent.
Then the partners signed a trilateral investment and project agreement to build a GTL plant scheduled to complete in 2017.
Shurtan was commissioned in 2001. The technology complex is designed to produce 150 kinds of polyethylene of high, medium and low pressure line.
The design capacity of Shurtan is 125,000 tons of polyethylene per year. The company produces 137 tons of liquefied gas, 130,000 tons of light condensate, and 4.2 billion cubic meters of marketable gas and 4000 tons of sulphur a year.
Uzbekneftegaz, an exclusive operator of oil and gas industry of Uzbekistan, was established in 1998 and operates six joint stock companies.
Uzbekistan for its natural gas production ranks second among the CIS countries and among the 10 largest producing countries of the world. The country produces over 60 billion cubic meters of natural gas, with a large part exported.