National Industrial Gases Company (Gas), an affiliate of Saudi Basic Industries Corporation (Sabic), has started a major expansion project at its Jubail complex, including a new air separation plant and a rare gases extraction unit to produce krypton-xenon for the first time in Saudi Arabia.

The new air separation plant will mainly meet the oxygen and nitrogen requirements of various Sabic expansion projects in Jubail and krypton-xenon marks the diversification of its rare gas portfolio. The rare-gas mixture will be exported to a US-based company, BOC Gases, which will refine and separate krypton and xenon to be marketed worldwide.

The new plant has capacity to produce 730,000 tonnes per year (tpy) of oxygen and offers an option to increase the complex's total nitrogen output by 600,000 tpy. The krypton-xenon plant will produce around 3 million litres per year of the mixture.

Krypton and xenon have niche applications in lighting, laser, space, satellite, medical and defense-related industries.

Krypton-xenon is the company's second major product diversification and first export product.

The company began producing argon, also a rare gas, in 1998, feeding the flat steel plant of Hadeed (Saudi Iron and Steel Company) and supplying to other local and regional customers. Hadeed is a wholly owned affiliate of Sabic.

The company plays a key role in supporting Sabic's other manufacturing industries in Jubail and Yanbu by meeting their requirements of industrial gases.

The company's first air separation plant in Yanbu came on stream in late 1999. With the startup of the new plant in Jubail, Gas will have total production capacity of about 2 million tpy of oxygen and 1.2 million tpy of nitrogen.

Gas is a joint venture between Sabic (70 per cent) and several Saudi producers of industrial gases (30 per cent). It was established in 1983 and its first nitrogen plant came on stream in 1984.