India's Uflex commissioned an AL-OX coater for Packaging films

(Plastemart) -- Uflex Ltd., India's largest flexible packaging manufacturer has commissioned an AL-OX coater for Packaging films at its Egypt plant in 6th of October City, near Cairo. With this, UFLEX joins the list of handful manufacturers, capable of producing ALOX-coated films. As part of the expansion plans in Egypt, Uflex Ltd. is ramping up production capacities for BOPP films (Bi-axially Oriented Poly Propylene film) to 35 KTa; 30000 tpa of PET (Polyester) and 12000 tpa of CPP films aggregating to total capacity of 77 KTa.

The company's planned investments in Egypt are pegged at USD 135 mln. The first line of this expansion involved adding capacities in BOPP films. The second line of setting up facilities for CPP films, work at the new 12.000 tpa facility, state-of-the-art Cast Polypropylene (CPP) film line has been commissioned and has become operational, whereas the third line to produce 30000 tpa of PET film will be operational by Dec 2011-Jan 2012.

MRC

(Platts) -- South Korea's Kumho P&B Chemicals has been operating its solvents lines at Yeosu at about 70-80% of capacity since July 6, a source close to the company said Tuesday.

The run cuts followed flooding caused by heavy rains and a disruption in steam and power supply, the source said, adding that the company hoped to ramp up to full capacity again by the end of the month.

Steam and power supplied by parent company Kumho Petrochemical was disrupted for two-three days, the source said, but gave no further details.

The company has three solvents lines but the 30-year-old No. 1 line, with the capacity to produce 30 KTa of phenol and 20 KTa of acetone, was scrapped in 2008 because of poor margins.

The No. 2 line can make 135 KTa of phenol and 84 KTa of acetone while the No. 3 line can deliver 205 KTa of phenol and 123 KTa of acetone.

MRC

(Arabian Oil and Gas) -- Saudi Arabia is commonly regarded as the world's swing producer of oil, with proven crude reserves of 264.5 billion barrels and production of around 9.7 million barrels of oil per day (bpd). However, a report in the Financial Times says the Kingdom's burgeoning domestic demand for oil, especially for electricity generation, may seriously restrict it's ability to continue to stabilise prices by increasing exports.

Saudi is already the world's sixth largest oil consumer, with domestic oil demand rocketing by 75% in the ten years to 2011. Domestic oil consumption is slated to rise by 5.6% this year from it's current rate of 2.81 million bpd.

Power generation in Saudi is particularly oil-intensicve as plants typically burn heavy crude, rather than refined oil.

Saudi is starting to expand it's gas exploitation, with Karan, the Kingdom's first non-associated gas field, beginning production now. However, oil looks set to remain the core energy source for electricity generation for several years.

MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- This week some European producers have declared growth of polyethylene (PE) export prices for FSU markets, due to rising prices of PE in the Asian market, high oil prices and the coming maintenance shutdowns, according to ICIS-MRC Price report.

Cheap imports from Asia and the Middle East has forced European producers to decrease significantly PE prices for the domestic market in June - July. Two months later after May peak, contract PE prices fell by EUR 120-140/t. A similar price decline also affected the export prices in FSU markets, which were reduced in the first half of July by some producers to EUR 1.050 - 1.120 / t, FCA for LDPE, and EUR 1.020 - 1.100 / t, FCA for HDPE.

In July, Asian markets showed increasing PE demand which along with growing oil prices led to increasing prices of polyethylene. Over the three weeks of July, PE prices in Asia rose by USD 50-80 / t. Growing polyethylene prices in the Asian market made some European producers change their pricing policies. Increasing price trend is also strengthened by the coming maintenance shutdowns of plants in the Eastern Europe, weakening rate of euro against dollar and high oil prices.

As a result, this week some producers from Eastern Europe have raised their export prices of polyethylene. Rising prices of LDPE and HDPE in the second half of July are within the range of EUR 20-80/t.

MRC

(ABS-CBNNews) -- Oil prices were mixed in Asian trade Monday as news of European banks passing closely-watched stress tests counteracted concerns over the US government's debt problems, analysts said. New York's main contract, light sweet crude for delivery in August, fell nine cents to USD 97.15 per barrel. Brent North Sea crude for September delivery was up 22 cents to USD 117.48.

"Oil is sort of holding steady, it's really pulled in all different directions," said Victor Shum, senior principal of Purvin and Gertz energy consultants in Singapore.

"On the one hand, the news late last week that most European banks have passed the stress tests... has supported crude futures," he told AFP.

The European Union's banking regulator the European Banking Authority on Friday announced that only eight of 91 banks had failed stress tests, a better than expected result amid the region's escalating debt woes.

Crude traders had been awaiting the results of the tests to gauge the impact of the eurozone's broadening debt crisis, which could potentially cut into European energy demand.

However, persistent worries of a political impasse in the United States over its debt crisis continued to hang over crude prices, Shum said.

MRC