Alexandria gets a Chinese port partner + Aramco fuels its next refinery

Building for the overflow

Alexandria is getting a dirty bulk terminal, and a Chinese company is building it. The Alexandria Port Authority signed an MoU with Xiamen C&D to develop the terminal at Al-Max Port, according to a Transport Ministry statement issued yesterday. Dirty bulk is the unprocessed cargo that can’t share a berth with grain: coal, clinker, and iron ore — the raw material feeding cement and steel. The design gives it storage yards, silos, two main quays, and handling facilities, with room for three of the largest bulk carriers at the same time once it’s built. It’s the first of four terminals planned for Al-Max Port, all part of the Greater Alexandria Port scheme inside the Sokhna-Alexandria logistics corridor.

The timing isn’t accidental, since transit containers through Alexandria and Dekheila ports rose 74% last fiscal year as carriers shifted to the Mediterranean to stay clear of the Red Sea, and the ports are feeling the squeeze. The Al-Max terminal and the Amreya dry port, which opens shortly, both belong to a wider plan for 33 dry ports and logistics zones along seven corridors. C&D wants more where this came from: managing director and CEO Liu Rongdian says the company is looking at further terminals and at commercial shipbuilding.

Aramco fuels its Chinese mega-refinery

Aramco’s China mega-refinery takes its first Saudi crude: Saudi Aramco and its Chinese partners have received the first Arabian crude shipment at their Hapco refining and petrochemical complex in Liaoning province, and commercial operations could begin in 1Q 2027, Bloomberg reports. The cargo arrived aboard the Kassab after loading at Saudi Juaymah port. The complex pairs a 300k bbl/d refinery with a capacity of around 1.6 mn tons of ethylene and 2 mn tons of paraxylene annually.

Aramco will supply most of the crude the refinery runs: The firm holds a 30% stake in Hapco alongside North Huajin (51%) and Panjin Xincheng (19%), and has the right to supply up to 210k bbl / d of crude to the complex.

Why this matters: The new capacity could help ease regional shortages of key inputs used in plastics, packaging, and polyester production, after the war disrupted Gulf petrochemical and naphtha exports. Before the conflict, naphtha shipments through Hormuz met 60-70% of Asia’s import requirements, according to S&P Global. Hapco’s paraxylene output could be particularly useful for China, which imported 9.6 mn tons of chemicals last year despite expanding domestic production.