EQUATE Petrochemical Company, Kuwait’s first international petrochemical joint-venture, announced the successful completion of a plant turnaround and the first phase of the polyethylene plant debottleneckingproject.

With the participation of over 10,000 employees and contractors, EQUATE says it completed all operations within a record time for petrochemical plants based on global standards.

All units were shutdown from the Nov. 20, 2014 to Dec. 20, 2014, and the units resumed their normal operations on Dec. 23.

The TA is a major activity that takes place once every eight years for a 30-day shutdown. All matters are thoroughly planned for technical experts to conduct comprehensive maintenance of a number of industrial units, which include ethylene, polyethylene, ethylene glycol and utilities, while ensuring absolute abidance by international best practices.

For the debottlenecking project, EQUATE executed the first phase. EQUATE’s current capacity of polyethylene is 825,000 tpy, and will reach almost 1 million tpy once the debottlenecking project is completed during 2016.

“This excellent achievement deserves utmost appreciation and gratitude," said EQUATE president and CEO Mohammad Husain. "On behalf of EQUATE, it gives me great pleasure to extend utmost gratefulness for their efforts, dedication and patience to realize such a distinguished milestone in the company’s history."