Joint Venture: Saudi Aramco and Malaysian Petronas Break Deal on Refinery Project

Saudi Aramco and Petroliam Nasional Bhd (Petronas) have reached an agreement to form two joint-ventures for the Refinery and Petrochemical Integrated Development (RAPID) project, which is part of the Pengerang Integrated Complex (PIC) in Johor, Malaysia.

The companies in a joint statement Wednesday said: The strategic alliance was a historic partnership between two of the most successful, largest national oil companies in the world, bringing together the experience, expertise, technologies, resources and commercial presence.

“Through this collaboration, Saudi Aramco would supply 50 percent of the refinery’s crude feedstock requirements with the option of increasing to 70 percent, while natural gas, power and other utilities would be supplied by Petronas and its affiliates,” the statement said.

The refinery, which has the capacity of 300, 000 barrels of crude per day, would produce a range of refined petroleum products, including gasoline and diesel, which meet Euro5 fuel specifications, and would also provide feedstock for PIC, with a nameplate capacity of 3.3 million metric tonnes per annum, the statement added.

“The PIC project is currently 87 percent completed, and is expected to be on track for refinery start-up in the first quarter of 2019,” it further added.

Commenting on the partnership, Saudi Aramco Senior Vice President of Downstream, Abdulaziz Judaimi said:

“This agreement strengthens Saudi Aramco’s position and growth in South East Asia through crude supply and world-scale downstream operations. Through this venture, we will also achieve a high degree of integration between refining and petrochemicals, with petrochemicals production greater than 20 percent of crude intake. It is also in tandem with our downstream growth strategy where we are investing in a global refining and petrochemicals system of strategically located world-scale manufacturing complexes with a participated refining capacity of eight to ten million barrels per day.” Mr Judaimi was quoted on Saudi Aramco’s website.

Aramco is the national oil company of Saudi Arabia and Petronas is the national oil company of Malaysia.