Since the 1960s the Antwerp region has become a hotspot for the chemical industry in Europe. Considerable investments by both Belgian and foreign companies led to a spectacular development of the port area. For years now, Antwerp can proudly name itself Europe’s largest petrochemical cluster.



Clustering effects
The conglomeration effect provides the Antwerp region with an important additional comparative advantage. A region with a certain critical mass – no less than ten of the world’s top twenty chemical giants have established major operations in Antwerp – benefits from all sorts of clustering effects. Because of these effects companies can exploit possible synergies to the full. This, in turn, results in important gains of efficiency.

Downstream integration
The basis of this cluster is formed by five refineries: three smaller, specialist facilities owned by Petroplus and two world-class refineries: Total and ExxonMobil. These five refineries have a primary distillation capacity of more than 40 million tonnes annually. Some of the crude oil is brought in by ship and barge. However, the two large refineries are connected to the Rotterdam-Antwerp Pipeline (RAPL). As its name implies, the RAPL connects the port of Antwerp with the port of Rotterdam, ensuring a constant supply of crude oil for the large refineries.

The next step in the further downstream integration is represented by the four crackers, which crack the naphtha from the refineries into basic components for the petrochemical industry such as ethylene and propylene. Three of these crackers are located on the site of Fina Antwerp Olefines, a joint venture between the two large refineries. A fourth naphtha cracker is located on BASF’s integrated production site. In turn the basic substances produced by the crackers are further processed within the cluster.



Export-oriented industry
On average, over 80% of chemicals produced in the Antwerp region are exported outside of Belgium. The neighbouring countries, Ireland and the United States are major trading partners.

More information
Website Essenscia – Belgian federation for Chemistry and Life Science Industries