Pipe extruder Poloplast plans ┬20 million investment

(Plastics Today) -- Pipe extruder Poloplast customers are the Vatican, Frankfurt Airport, and the Conference Palace Hotel in Abu Dhabi, and the new outlay will help the firm serve an even broader customer base, predicts the company's management.

The ┬20 million ($27.1 million) investment in the company's headquarters will be made in equal installments starting in 2011,according to Wolfgang Lux, the processor's managing director. The investment, funded entirely from cash flow, will be invested in new compounding and pipe extrusion equipment, injection molding lines for pipe fittings, and plant infrastructure.

Poloplast (Leonding, Austria) extrudes polypropylene pipe and tubing for the water and sewage lines as well as for home and building construction. This year Lux expects the company to reach sales of about ┬75 million, comparable to the sales it realized in 2009.

MRC

(Plastics News) -- Auto supplier Visteon Corp. is making a ⌠multi million dollar investment in its interiors and electronics production in Brazil, including injection molding operations.

Most of the funds will go toward expanding and modernizing Visteon's plant in Guarulhos, which makes instrument panels, consoles and other interiors, the company said in a Nov. 23 press release. Much of the focus there will be on injection molding. Other improvements are set for Visteon's plant in Manaus, which makes electronics parts including instrument clusters and audio systems.

Visteon, based in the Detroit suburb of Van Buren Township, wants to increase its business in Brazil by 50 percent during the next three years, said Alfeu Doria, the company's lead executive in Brazil.

MRC

(Plastics News) -- Pipe maker Advanced Drainage Systems Inc. is opening a new extrusion plant in Buxton, N.D., which will supply a growing market for high density polyethylene pipe in the region. The company, based in Hilliard, said that it is seeing ⌠enormous demand for corrugated HDPE pipe in the area.

⌠By manufacturing pipe as close to our customers as possible, it will significantly reduce the time and cost of delivery, Chairman and CEO Joe Chlapaty said in a Nov. 22 news release.

The demand is coming for uses in both agricultural and construction in the U.S., Manitoba, Saskatchewan and western Ontario, the company said.

The Buxton facility will open by spring 2011.

MRC

(Plastics News) -- Rowland Technologies Inc. and Arkema Inc. have introduced Rowlar high-performance polyvinylidene fluoride films for photovoltaic front-sheet applications.

Wallingford-based Rowland's origins go back about 40 years, when it was one of the first companies to extrude polycarbonate film. The company also extrudes impact-modified acrylic sheet and polysulfone-type films. Major markets include electronics, automotive and graphic arts.

Rowland developed Rowlar using Arkema's Kynar PVDF resin, which has been used in architectural coatings for decades, where it has demonstrated excellent weatherability.

Compared to ethylene tetrafluoroethylene (ETFE) film, Rowlar is more transparent, more abrasion-resistant, and more cost effective, according to Rowland.

MRC

(LUKOIL) -- LUKOIL Group total hydrocarbon production available for sale reached 2,249 th. boe per day in nine months of 2010, which is a 1.6% increase y-o-y. Crude oil production by LUKOIL Group in nine months of 2010 totalled 72.27 mln tons.

Natural and petroleum gas output of LUKOIL Group available for sale was 13.80 bcm (grew by 26.1% y-o-y) of which output as part of international projects totalled 3.65 bcm and output in Russia was 10.15 bcm. Increase in Group hydrocarbon production was due to a larger amount of gas sales to Gazprom and hydrocarbon production growth in international projects.

Throughputs at the Company's refineries (including its share in throughput at ISAB and TRN refining complexes) increased by 6.7% y-o-y in nine months of 2010 and reached 49.70 mln tons. Throughputs at the Company's refineries in Russia increased by 1.1% y-o-y, throughputs at the Company's international refineries grew by 21.4% y-o-y.

MRC