3.2. Chemical Industry with Special Reference to Petro-chemicals

Chemical industry is based on two types of raw materials: natural like minerals, coal, petroleum, salts, potash, sulphur, limestone, gypsum and vegetable products and by products of other industries such as paper and pulp industry, iron and steel industry and gas

manufacturing industry. Major factor for the location of chemical industry are availability of raw materials, cheaper means of transport for bulky materials, water supply, sources for energy and demand of chemicals in other industries.3.2.2. Europe 3.2.3. West Asia The largest refinery in West Asia is located at Abadan (Iran). West Asia is a large producer of petroleum but there is little demand because the region is not industrially developed. Thus, most of the petrochemical complexes are located on the coasts in order to facilitate export. Saudi Arabia has a large petro-chemical complex at Ras Tanura while Mina-el-Ahmadi is the largest petro-chemical complex of Kuwait.