A large-scale China Petrochemical Corporation (Sinopec) ethylene project, capable of producing 700,000 tons of ethylene per year, went into operation on Thursday in Lanzhou, capital of northwest China's Gansu Province.

With a total investment of nearly seven billion yuan (about US$875 million), the project boasts state-of-the-art ethylene production equipment, said Yu Baocai, general manager of Sinopec's Lanzhou branch.

The project was kicked off in April 2005.

Yu said the new ethylene project will increase branch sales by ten billion yuan (about US$1.3 billion) and generate a profit of two billion yuan.

The manager said the project will be a boon for the textile, clothing, automobile, electronic, building materials and plastic industries in northwest China.

A fundamental material in petrochemicals, ethylene is used in the manufacture of various sorts of chemical products such as plastics, chemical fibre and synthetic rubber.

The ethylene industry is sometimes considered an indicator of economic development in a nation or a region. China produced more than 7.5 million tons of ethylene in 2005, ranking second in the world after the United States.

(Xinhua News Agency November 24, 2006)