JAC's restart impeded by messy stakeholder structure

Singapore

AS of now, operations at the Jurong Aromatics Corporation (JAC) have been stalled longer than they have ever been running.

It has been almost a half year since JAC closed its petrochemical complex on Jurong Island for maintenance, having fallen victim to poor market conditions less than five months after its August 2014 launch.

The economics for aromatics production has since improved, and the maintenance work was completed in March, but new issues have cropped up to stall the restart of the US$2.4 billion plant - and this is even as the company is estimated to have at least two million barrels of condensates idling in the Jurong Rock Caverns.

The main driver of JAC's petrochemical facility is the production of paraxylene, an aromatic used to make polyester. The facility, which consists of a condensate splitter and an aromatics complex, can also produce aromatics such as benzene and orthoxylene and petroleum pr…