The Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC) and Taqa (Abu Dhabi National Energy Company) have signed a 27-year agreement for the supply of important utilities to the Ta'ziz Industrial Chemicals Zone located in Ruwais.

As part of the deal, ADNOC and Taqa will work together to develop the central utilities project, which includes steam production, process cooling, water and wastewater utilities, and an electricity grid, according to a statement made on January 28.

The initiative is expected to support Ta’ziz’s chemicals and transition fuels projects and includes the offtake of the facility's construction and utilities.

Regarding the deal, Ta’ziz CEO Mashal Al Kindi said: “Reliable and efficient utilities remain central to our value proposition, providing industry leaders with the stable infrastructure essential for world-scale chemicals and transition-fuels manufacturing”.

Currently, Ta’ziz is playing a role in boosting the contribution of the UAE’s GDP to $81.68bn by 2031 by helping grow the country’s industrial strategy – Ruwais industrial zone alone is expected to produce 4.7mn tonnes per year of chemical products starting 2028, including methanol, polyvinyl chloride (PVC), ethylene dichloride (EDC) low-carbon ammonia, vinyl chloride monomer (VCM) and caustic soda, and will play an important part in reaching the said GDP targets.

Last year, Ta’ziz revealed that it had signed two product sale agreement term sheets with India’s Sanmar Group, a global manufacturer of specialty chemicals.

As part of the deal, Ta’ziz – based in Al Ruwais Industrial City in the UAE – was expected to supply Sanmar with more than 350,000 tonnes per year of EDC and VCM for up to 10 years, which are made at and exported from the Ta’ziz Chemicals Industrial Zone. According to AlchemPro, the deal marked the first time such chemicals had been exported from the UAE.

ADNOC’s current utilities project will be developed on a build-own-operate basis by a project company owned by ADNOC at 40% and Taqa at 60%. Operations and maintenance will be overseen jointly by the two companies.