Shell expects new US petrochemical complex to start up by year-end: CFO

Shell Chemicals expects its new petrochemical complex in southwest Pennsylvania to come online by year-end, Royal Dutch Shell CFO Jessica Uhl said Feb. 3.

She said during the company's Q4 2021 earnings call that the company was finishing up the project in 2022, "which should hopefully be up and running by the end of the year."

The project's startup was delayed from earlier in 2022 after Shell temporarily suspended work in 2020 to implement safety protocols at the height of coronavirus-related shutdowns.

The project in Monaca, Pennsylvania, includes a 1.6 million mt/year cracker and three polyethylene plants with a combined capacity of 1.6 million mt/year. Of those three plants, one will produce high density PE and the other two will produce linear low density PE.

The project also will mark Shell's re-entry into polyolefins. In 2017, CEO Ben Van Beurden said during a company earnings call that Shell has been in polyolefins "through a very difficult convoluted way in the past through a number of joint ventures," but the new complex "will be a re-entry in a way that will sustain our position as a polyolefins player."