Japan's Marubeni signs deal with Kuwait-led refinery

Japan's major trading firm Marubeni Corp. announced that it has concluded a long-term agreement with the Kuwait-led refinery joint venture in Vietnam to purchase polypropylene and sulfur. Under the deal with Nghi Son Refinery and Petrochemical LLC, Marubeni will off-take a certain portion of annual production of 370,000 tons of polypropylene for the long-term period to distribute mainly within the Vietnamese domestic market and export partially, the Tokyo-based company said in a press release. The USD nine billion oil refinery project, which commercial operations expected to start in 2017, is jointly owned by state-run Kuwait Petroleum International (KPI), Japan's leading oil refiner Idemitsu Kosan Co., PetroVietnam and Mitsui Chemicals Inc. Marubeni is the only non-shareholding company selected as off-taker of petrochemical products from Nghi Son Refinery and Petrochemical Complex for its polypropylene import sales and propylene handling in Vietnam, it said. In addition, Marubeni will off-take half of the annual production of sulfur for the long-term period to distribute domestically in Vietnam and export to neighboring countries, where rapid demand increase is expected, it said. The 200,000 barrels per day refinery and petrochemical complex will be based in the northern Vietnamese province of Thanh Hoa, some 180 kilometers south of Hanoi. Construction for the plant will commence next month with completion scheduled for 2016, the joint venture announced earlier this month. It is Vietnam's second refinery and the first one with foreign investors' participation. KPI's parent company Kuwait Petroleum Corporation (KPC) is to supply all the feedstock for the facility. KPI and Idemitsu each own a 35. 1 percent stake in the joint project, with PetroVietnam and Mitsui Chemicals Inc. putting up 25.1 percent and 4.7 percent, respectively.