SHENYANG, Sept. 2 (Xinhua) -- Construction of the first phase of a mega petrochemicals project in northeast China's Liaoning Province has been completed and the facility went onstream Tuesday.

The project is located in Panjin City and operated by Bora LyondellBasell Petrochemical Co. Ltd., a joint venture between Netherlands-based chemicals giant LyondellBasell and Chinese petrochemical company Liaoning Bora Enterprise Group.

Cracking facilities started a trial run on Aug. 5 and the phase I project is expected to produce 1.4 million tonnes of polyolefin products a year at full capacity.

With a total investment of about 80 billion yuan (about 11.7 billion U.S. dollars), the project will be completed in three phases. Construction of the first phase started in October 2017.

As a major foreign investment project in Liaoning, the project when completed is estimated to generate an annual revenue of 80 billion yuan and create some 3,000 jobs.

Bob Patel, CEO of LyondellBasell, said demand for polyolefin products in the Chinese market has gradually recovered and shown a long-term growth trend despite the impact of the COVID-19 epidemic, which is good news for the project.

The petrochemicals industry is one of the pillar businesses in Liaoning. The province achieved a sales revenue of 140 billion U.S. dollars from the petrochemical industry in 2019. Enditem