Fluor Team Will Build Plant

A Fluor Corp. joint venture received a $100-million contract from a Dow Chemical Co. venture to design and build a plant in Argentina to produce ethylene and other feedstock chemicals for making plastics.

Irvine-based Fluor, the largest engineering and construction company in the United States, and Buenos Aires-based Perez Compac SA expect to begin construction on the plant in Bahia Blanca in September and complete the $300-million project within two years.

The contract was awarded by Petroquimica Bahia Blanca, a joint venture of Michigan-based Dow Chemical; Itochu, a Japanese trading company, and YPF SA, Argentina’s largest energy company. The venture also is renovating its Bahia Blanca petrochemical complex.

Fluor’s stock closed at $39.31 a share, off $1.13, while Dow’s rose 56 cents to $90.94.