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Linde Builds Industrial-Scale Air Separation Plant in Kazakhstan
May 6, 2010 The Linde Group will construct a large, state-of-the-art air separation plant for ArcelorMittal at its Temirtau site in Kazakhstan. The plant, scheduled to go on stream mid-2012, will be Kazakhstan's first industrial-scale development with a daily capacity of 2000 tonnes.
With an investment value of around EUR 95 million, it is the first plant that Linde will engineer and operate for a customer in Kazakhstan.
"This investment gives us a successful foothold in Kazakhstan's emerging economy. Kazakhstan is a country that has around 40 billion barrels of proven oil reserves," said Dr. Aldo Belloni, Member of the Executive Board of Linde AG. "We are particularly pleased to partner with such a long-standing, well-established customer as ArcelorMittal in the move to further expand our reach in Eastern Europe and Central Asia. At several locations in Germany and Eastern Europe, we already supply ArcelorMittal with various gases."
Linde signed a long-term contract with JSC ArcelorMittal Temirtau to supply the Temirtau steelworks with oxygen and nitrogen gas. The new plant will also supply liquefied oxygen, nitrogen, and argon to the merchant market in Kazakhstan. Target customers in central and southern Kazakhstan are mainly in the steel and manufacturing industries, but the plant will also supply customers specialized in oil and gas in western Kazakhstan.
Linde's Engineering Division is responsible for constructing the plant. Once it goes on stream, it will be operated by the local Linde Gas company. The new facility will partly replace existing air separators that ArcelorMittal operates itself.
With an annual capacity of around 4 million tonnes, the ArcelorMittal Temirtau steelworks in northeastern Kazakhstan produces hot rolled coils, cold rolled coils, galvanized and pre-painted coils. It also recently commissioned a bar and light section mill. The flat products are used mainly for the mechanical industry, and pipe and tube sector for various applications. Bar products will meet the requirement of domestic construction needs.
The Linde Group is a world leading gases and engineering company with almost 48,000 employees working in more than 100 countries worldwide. In the 2009 financial year it achieved sales of EUR 11.2 billion.