BASF inaugurated new beadmill inaugurated at Deeside, United Kingdom site

MOSCOW (MRC) -- BASF’s Coatings division has started up a new Netzsch LMZ25 beadmill at its site in Deeside, UK, reported BASF on its site.

The modern mill will be used to manufacture intermediate pigment pastes in the PVC plastisol production process. The beadmill replaces a Cox triple-roll mill that was more than 50 years old.

The new mill has a closed grinding system, which prevents volatile organic compounds (VOCs) from escaping into the environment. A modern automatic process control system allows the mill to be run without an operator in attendance. "Our company is one of the top three in the coil coatings business. The new technology will help us do our work with even higher quality and efficiency," said Jan Baumgartner, head of BASF’s Industrial Coatings Europe business unit, at the ribbon-cutting ceremony.

The Deeside production site of BASF’s Coatings division mainly manufactures products for the coil coatings market. One of the major end users for the precoated steel and aluminum panels is the construction industry. These panels are also used for household appliances and in the automotive sector.

As MRC informed previously, in November 2014, BASF and Hemmelrath Technologies, a company that is specialized in modular facility concepts for the production of paint and coatings, have decided to cooperate in order to develop future-oriented concepts of pigment technology.

BASF’s Coatings division develops, produces and markets innovative automotive coatings, automotive refinishes and industrial coatings as well as decorative paints. The company operate sites in Europe, North America and South America as well as Asia Pacific. In 2013, the Coatings division achieved global sales of EUR2.9 billion.

BASF is the world’s leading chemical company. Its portfolio ranges from chemicals, plastics, performance products and crop protection products to oil and gas. BASF had sales of about EUR74 billion in 2013 and over 112,000 employees as of the end of the year.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Clariant, a world leader in specialty chemicals, has signed an agreement to divest its Water Treatment business operating in Argentina, Brazil and Colombia to Ecolab Inc., as per the company's press release.

The transaction is subject to certain conditions precedent, as well as regulatory approvals. The Water Treatment business of Clariant in Latin America provides chemicals and services to a wide range of industries, including textile, food and beverage, chemical, pulp & paper, and personal & home care.

The divestment to Ecolab does not include Clariant’s Water Treatment activities related to the oil and gas industry in the Latin America region. This segment has been integrated into the Oil & Mining Business within the Natural Resources Business Area. Clariant has been providing products and services for the oil & gas sector for more than 30 years in Latin America, with production plants and laboratories to develop solutions to attend to present and future customer demands.

"The divestment of the Latin American Water Treatment business is a result of our continuous active portfolio management, based on Clariant‘s profitable growth strategy", said Michael Pronin, Region Head Latin America. "Our company will continue providing Water Treatment solutions to the oil & gas segment, as part of the package of services we offer to this important industry in our region".

As MRC reported earlier, in July 2014, Clariant closed the sale of its water treatment business in Africa to AECI, domiciled in South Africa. The total value of the divestment amounts to CHF 34 million in cash at closing. The transaction was subject to certain precedent conditions.

Ecolab is the global leader in water, hygiene and energy technologies and services.

Clariant AG is a Swiss chemical company and a world leader in the production of specialty chemicals for the textile, printing, mining and metallurgical industries. It is engaged in processing crude oil products in pigments, plastics and paints.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Huntsman Corp., the world’s second-biggest maker of titanium dioxide pigment, is planning to close one of its European plants amid weak demand for the white colorant used in paints and plastics, said Bloomberg.

Huntsman probably doesn’t need all seven of its European plants that make titanium dioxide, known by its chemical formula TiO2, Chief Financial Officer Kimo Esplin said today in a conference webcast. The Salt Lake City-based chemical maker may spend 100 million euros (USD124 million) to close 100,000 tons of annual pigment production, he said.

Huntsman in October acquired TiO2 assets from Rockwood Holdings Inc. (ROC) with plans to separate and sell shares in the pigments business next year. The company said last week it will eliminate about 900 jobs in the unit. Pigment will be a break-even business in the fourth quarter amid weak European demand and globally lower prices, Esplin said.

"We are the guys that have the ability to take out capacity more than anyone else,” Esplin said. “We have 100,000 tons of excess capacity."

Huntsman can recover the cost of closing a European TiO2 plant in two to three years, he said.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Chevron Lummus Global (CLG), a JV between Chevron and CB&I, announced the successful start-up of an integrated hydrocracker and base oil plant using CLG's ISOCRACKING, ISODEWAXING and ISOFINISHING technologies by Russian refiner OJSC TANECO, said Hydrocarbonprocessing.

The Russian petroleum refining industry project is being conducted under the JSC TATNEFT group of companies. The integration design of the two units offered excellent opportunity to minimize the investment, according to project officials.

The hydrocracker unit was commissioned in January 2014 and the base oil unit in December 2014. The commissioning of the two units enabled OJSC TANECO to produce 1.2 million tpy of Euro-V diesel fuel, 500,000 tpy of aviation kerosene and 190,000 tpy of Group II/III base oil.

The high-quality base oil production was possible by processing excellent quality lube oil feedstock from the hydrocracker. This premium lube oil production, according to OJSC TANECO, is unmatched by other base oil capacity in the Russian Federation and it gives OJSC TANECO competitive advantage in the base oil market.

Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev, Tatarstan President Rustam Minninikhanov and JSC TATNEFT CEO Nail Maganov attended the opening ceremony of the startup of this strategic project at OJSC TANECO oil refinery.

"As the world leading hydroprocessing technology licensor, we are thrilled to continue to hear success stories like OJSC TANECO and grateful to see our products offer competitive advantage to our clients in their market," said Leon de Bruyn, managing director at Chevron Lummus Global.

Chevron Phillips Chemical recently announced the construction of a world-scale ethylene cracker in Baytown, Texas, two world-scale polyethylene reactors in Old Ocean, Texas and the start-up of the world’s largest 1-hexene facility in Baytown. The 1-hexene plant, capable of producing up to 250,000 tpy, is co-located with this expansion project at the Cedar Bayou plant. Chevron says the two plants will enjoy synergies as they both share the same infrastructure and workforce talent.

Chevron Phillips Chemica, headquartered in The Woodlands, Texas (north of Houston), US,l is one of the world’s top producers of olefins and polyolefins and a leading supplier of aromatics, alpha olefins, styrenics, specialty chemicals, piping, and proprietary plastics. Chevron and Phillips 66 each own 50% of Chevron Phillips Chemical.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Toray Industries, Inc. has announced that the company and its subsidiary Toray Advanced Materials Korea, Inc. would expand the production facility for high-performance polypropylene (PP) spunbond at P.T. Toray Polytech Jakarta (TPJ) by 18,000 tons per year, as per the company's press release.

After the enhancement, the production capacity of TPJ will be about 37,000 tons per year, boosting the Toray Group-wide PP spunbond production capacity to about 153,000 tons per year.

The added production facility at TPJ is expected to start operating in September 2016.

Demand for disposable baby diapers is forecast to rapidly grow in ASEAN countries with the improvement in the people’s lifestyle, as their national income increases. In addition, demand for disposable diapers for elderly is expected to expand in developed and semi-developed countries in East Asia due to the advent of declining birthrates and aging societies. Under such circumstances, demand for PP spunbond, which is the main material for making disposable diapers, is expected to grow to 660,000 tons per year in 2016 from 493,000 tons in 2013 and to 936,000 tons per year in 2020.

In response to this robust demand, Toray Group has been expanding the production capacities of its PP spunbond production bases in Korea, People’s Republic of China and Indonesia in advance.

In June 2013, TPJ’s first facility started operations, and the Group’s production base in China, Toray Polytech (Nantong) Co. will start operation of a new production line later this month.

Toray Group will enhance its PP spunbond supply structure based on the three bases in Korea, China and Indonesia and build firm relationships with global hygiene product manufacturers in order to drive forward sales expansion in emerging markets such as in rapidly growing China and ASEAN countries as well as in the growth fields.

As MRC wrote before, in summer 2012, Toray Industries in partnership with Gevo Inc. signed an offtake agreement for renewable bio-paraxylene (bioPX) produced at Gevo's planned pilot plant. The agreement will enable Toray to carry out pilot-scale production of fully renewable, bio-based polyethylene terephthalate (fully bioPET), of its fibers and films for the first time in the world.

Toray Industries is a multinational corporation headquartered in Japan that specializes in industrial products centered around technologies in organic synthetic chemistry, polymer chemistry, and biochemistry. Its founding business areas were fibers and textiles, as well as plastics and chemicals. Toray Group Malaysia companies are involved in four main businesses -- polyester fibres, textiles, plastic resins and polyester films.
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