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Sohar Port and Freezone is building a USD 550 mn PTA-to-PET corridor to lock in export-grade industrial volumes of the essential chemical material. The project — to be executed by subsidiaries of MAK Germany and OQ Refineries and Petroleum Industries — targets 1.5 mn tons per year of Purified Terephthalic Acid (PTA) and Polyethylene Terephthalate (PET) — split across 11.9 hectares at Sohar Port and 53.6 hectares at Sohar Freezone.
Uh, what’s PTA and PET, Enterprise? PTA is the chemical material made from paraxylene that gets converted into polyester materials, while PET is the mass-market polyester plastic used primarily in packaging, especially bottles, textiles, and fibers.
The supply chain rationale: Sohar is pulling bigger chunks of the chain under its roof. Paraxylene feedstock, the main PTA input, will be sourced by OQ by supplying paraxylene, while Monoethylene Glycol (MEG) and Acetic Acid will be imported through Sohar and moved via a dedicated pipeline network routed through Advario’s bulk-liquid storage at the port.
Why it matters?
Europe’s cost base is the push factor. The complex is set in Sohar as a relocation of assets acquired by MAK Germany from Indorama Ventures Rotterdam PTA/PET site that shut in 2024 amid high costs.
The complex is mainly targeting the Middle East, Africa, Asia, and Europe, but Europe matters here because it’s a huge net-importer of PET. The continent’s utilization of PET in 2022 reached 5 mn tons, with PET production of just 3.9 mn tons — and this is well before the shutdown of the Rotterdam site. That shows a downward trend compared to 2021, when PET production was 4.2 mn tons, according to Independent Commodity Intelligence Services (pdf).
The benchmark
China is the world’s biggest producer of PTA and PET, and its PTA capacity now exceeds 90 mn tons, with the Omani project representing just 1.6% of that volume. Meanwhile, Beijing is grappling with acute overcapacity in PTA and bottle-grade PET, suggesting that the project may face stiff competition for market share unless it secures uptake on the basis of quality or favorable arrangements under freetrade pacts.
