Saudi Aramco’s US subsidiary Motiva Enterprises is not expected to take a call on the additional petrochemical projects it seeks to build along the Gulf of Mexico coast in the near future, according to an industry analyst.

Motiva is reportedly busy working on its plans to build a petrochemicals plant at its existing refinery complex in Port Arthur, Texas.

“I think their current plans will keep them busy,” the analyst said.

In April this year, during Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s trip to the US, Motiva announced its plans to build an ethane steam cracker and an aromatics plant at its Port Arthur site.

The Aramco subsidiary signed agreements with US downstream technology services provider Honeywell UOP and French energy engineering firm TechnipFMC, worth between $8bn and $10bn respectively, to study petrochemical production technology for use in its proposed petchem plant.

Motiva also said the Port Arthur petchem project and the MoUs with the technology providers was the first step toward expansion into petrochemicals in North America, and is expected to make final investment decisions in 2019 on other possible projects along the US Gulf coast.

“They are actively evaluating them, although they will make the investment decisions at an appropriate time,” the analyst said.

In April, Motiva also announced it would be expanding its existing Port Arthur refinery’s capacity from 603,000 barrels a day (b/d) to 1.5 million b/d.

The damage caused by Hurricane Harvey in August last year is understood to be one of the reasons why Motiva weeks later changed its decision to build on refining capacity from units outside Port Arthur.

Regarding petrochemical demand in the West, the analyst said: “I’d say even in the established economies like the US and the EU, there’s going to be growth [in demand] in those locations at the same level as emerging economies.

"The high petrochemical demand growth regions are the US and western Europe, which are very big markets. So even at a smaller percentage growth you can still have some volumes to support that new supply that’s coming from these projects.”