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Russia’s state-run petrochemical company SIBUR has terminated its contract with Turkish construction firm Yamata for a major styrene and polystyrene project worth $2.1 billion in Tatarstan, according to Russian media.
Nizhnekamskneftekhim (NKNH), a SIBUR subsidiary, sent Yamata a notice terminating the contract to build the "Styrene Chain" at its Nizhnekamsk facility, Business Online reported, citing "insufficient mobilization of personnel."
About 1,000 workers, mostly citizens of Uzbekistan and Tajikistan, have left the construction site over the past month, the report suggested, amid delayed salary payments at Yamata and Ukrainian UAV attacks on the industrial zone. Sources cited by the Russian outlet linked the departures to the deteriorating situation at the site.
The report also linked Yamata’s financial problems to losses incurred during construction of the Amur Gas Processing Plant, owned by Gazprom, and the Amur Gas Chemical complex, which is 60% owned by SIBUR and 40% by China’s Sinopec.
A court record showed that 56 lawsuits have been filed against Yamata over the past three months, the report said. Of those, 28 remain pending, involving more than 379.7 million rubles, while claims totaling more than 411.2 million rubles have been upheld.
The report further added that Yamata founder and CEO Cengiz Duyar traveled from Türkiye to Nizhnekamsk last week as the company dealt with the problems at the construction site.
Sberbank, Russia’s largest state-owned bank, which is financing Yamata’s operations in the country and has issued a bank guarantee for the project, also sent a delegation led by Vice President Petr Koltypin to the site.
SIBUR is considering whether to enforce the guarantee, although its value has not been disclosed. Sberbank wants to assess the amount of work Yamata has completed before deciding on further action, while additional financing for the Turkish contractor is also being discussed, according to the report.
Construction of the Styrene Chain is 65% complete, with the facility scheduled to launch in 2028. To complete the remaining work, SIBUR is considering transferring Yamata’s scope to another contractor, with Turkish firm Esta emerging as the leading candidate, the report said.
Esta previously served as the general contractor for NKNH’s Hexene-1 project, a 50,000-ton-a-year facility that produces an intermediate used in polyethylene production.
The Styrene Chain is designed to produce 400,000 tons of styrene and 250,000 tons of polystyrene annually, aiming to help make the Russian market self-sufficient in polystyrene and ABS plastics.
About 2,500 people are involved in the facilities, with the workforce expected to reach 5,000 specialists during the peak construction period.
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