To be situated in the PPC complex at the Pars Special Economic Zone in Assaluyeh, the plant will have capacity of 250,000 tonnes a year (t/y), of which 200,000 t/y will be general-purpose polystyrene and another 50,000 t/y expandable polystyrene.

The other bidders for the project are South Korea's Daelim Industrial Companyand Italy's Snamprogetti, which built PPC's existing 600,000-t/y styrene plant. Other facilities at PPC are large propane and butane units, which provide feedstock for downstream facilities.

A second polystyrene project is out to tender at Tabriz Petrochemical Company (TPC). The new unit will double existing production of 25,000 t/y of general-purpose polystyrene. The project was originally launched with a bid closing date in late October but this has now been extended to late November at the request of bidders, which wanted more detailed bid documents. TPC will use a sulphur reactor. It has ethylene production of 140,000 t/y, propylene production of 57,000 t/y and styrene production of 87,000 t/y.