Britain facing higher winter gas imports due to Rough outage

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Even if Britain's main natural gas storage site manages to resume some withdrawals, the country will need to import up to 1.75 Bcm of additional gas this winter, according to Hydrocarbonprocessing.

Centrica, the operator of the Rough storage site, warned on Friday that a shutdown for tests there would last until March or April, although it held out hope that withdrawals could restart from four wells in November. "With the UK likely to have a 1.20-1.75 Bcm shortfall of gas in storage compared to last year's use (potentially an average supply shortfall of 11 Mcmd), the UK gas balance will likely have to replace that volume from other sources," said Trevor Sikorski, an analyst at UK-based consultancy Energy Aspects.

Britain depends on stored reserves to help manage winter demand spikes and to ensure security of supply. The Rough site accounts for more than 70% of the UK's storage capacity, National Grid data shows. "It is expected that four wells (of 24 operated typically) will be opened to allow withdrawal from November. Working gas at Rough for the winter will now not exceed 1.3 Bcm ...this is 1.2 Bcm less than last winter's withdrawal," Sikorski said.

This leaves Britain going into winter with record low storage levels and raises questions about the ageing site's long-term future. "(The Rough outage) will no doubt increase the UK's dependency on gas imports and increase its exposure to European and global fundamentals," said analysts at S&P Global Platts.

Britain may have to pay a premium to get the gas it needs to cover winter demand, especially if there is a very cold winter like 2012/2013, as it competes with other European countries for supply.

The winter gas contract is already near a one-year high. Sources of additional supply include imports of LNG, of Norwegian gas, and of gas from Europe via the InterconnectorUK (IUK) pipeline, which has a capacity of 10.6 Bcm or 70 Mcmd.

Last winter, Britain's imports averaged 75 Mcmd from November to March. LNG import terminals have excess capacity and around 15 Bcm more LNG could be available to come to Europe this winter, Sikorski said.

In the event of a really cold winter, UK prices will have to rise to attract the gas from Norway, continental Europe or LNG suppliers. British gas prices could rise above Asian LNG prices to attract supply to UK terminals, said Oliver Sanderson, gas analyst at Thomson Reuters.

Asian LNG prices for September delivery are currently trading around 43.60 pence per therm, below British gas prices for winter delivery of 46.75 pence per therm. "This is a far smaller likelihood than the need for more imports from the Continent, but (this) cannot be discounted at present," Sanderson said.

MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Shareholders of Dow Chemical Co. and DuPont Co. approved the companies’ historic merger, clearing a hurdle for the deal to close this year and for a later split into three entities, said Bloomberg.

Majorities of both sets of stockholders approved the 50-50 combination of the two largest U.S. chemical makers, the companies said in a joint statement Wednesday. The USD59 billion all-stock transaction, a record for the industry, was announced Dec. 11.

DuPont Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Ed Breen will serve as CEO of DowDuPont Inc., the name of the combined entity. His counterpart at Dow, Andrew Liveris, will be chairman. Both companies are eliminating thousands of jobs as they cut billions of dollars in expenses, with another USD3 billion of cost savings promised after the deal closes. DowDuPont is supposed to split into three by the end of 2018, creating separate companies focused on agriculture, specialty products and materials science.

The companies’ next hurdle is winning antitrust clearance. The U.S. Justice Department in February issued a second request for information on the combination, launching an in-depth probe. Dow and DuPont notified China’s competition agency of the deal in May and they filed with the European Commission last month.

MRC

МОSCOW (MRC) -- Celanese Corporation has replaced its secured credit facility with an unsecured credit facility, consisting of a USD500-million unsecured term loan and a USD1-billion unsecured revolver, each maturing in July 2021, said the Moody's.

The transaction was completed on 15 July. Moody’s today upgraded Celanese to an investment-grade rating for the first time since it was acquired by Blackstone in 2004. Celanese CFO Chris Jensen said that the "transaction represents a key step in the progression towards [Celanese] goal of an investment grade credit rating. The upgrade is tempered by a bolt-on acquisition driven growth strategy, which, adds a modest level of event risk. However, if it is successful, it should allow the company to grow significantly faster than GDP while improving profitability," stated John Rogers, Senior Vice President at Moody's and lead analyst on Celanese. "We expect that Celanese will continue to generate USD500-800 million per year of free cash flow, which should fund these transactions and provide additional flexibility to undertake opportunistic share repurchases."

As MRC informed earlier, in 2015, Mitsui & Co. announced that Fairway Methanol LLC, a 50-50 joint venture between Mitsui and US-based chemicals company Celanese, has commenced production of methanol at its planned annual production capacity of 1.3 million tons.

Celanese Corporation is a global technology leader in the production of differentiated chemistry solutions and specialty materials used in most major industries and consumer applications. Based in Dallas, Celanese employs approximately 7,000 employees worldwide and had 2015 net sales of USD5.7 billion.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- A fresh round of talks between Iran's National Petrochemical Company (NPC) and Linde AG of Germany has begun over investment and participation in Iran’s most strategic petrochemical complex, said En.mehrnews.

Six month after the implementation of Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), no official agreement has been signed with a foreign firm for development, investment attraction of reopening of credit and finance lines in the country’s petchem industries.

Despite the inking of a contract with France’s Total for construction of a petrochemical plant in southern Iran, as well as numerous talks with Japan’s Mitsubishi and BASF of Germany to fund ongoing projects in Iran, neither negotiations nor MoUs have led to sealing of new contracts in the country’s petrochemical industry.

Meanwhile, Iran’s petrochemical production capacity has reached about 62 million tons per year though National Petrochemical Company (NPC) officials have estimated that the figure will hit 100 million tons upon implementation of the Sixth National Development Plan.

European and in particular German companies appear to be more willing to make investments in petrochemical industries of Iran.

Accordingly, Linde of Germany has recently launched talks with NPC aiming to ink the first BOO (build, own, operate) contract for construction, completion and implementation of Damavand Petrochemical Complex.

Iran’s most strategic petrochemical project in Asaluyeh, Damavand Petrochemical Complex, provides utilities and offsite services required for petrochemical projects at Phase II of Pars Special Economic Energy Zone (PSEEZ).

Member of the Executive Board of Linde AG Responsible for the Engineering Division Christian Bruch had said last year in an oil conference in Tehran "Linde will partake in Iran’s petchem market following JCPOA implementation and the lifting of sanction."

Moreover, the German firm has begun talks with Iranian petrochemical companies to provide goods, equipment and spare parts. The Linde Group, registered as Linde AG, is a multinational industrial gases and engineering company founded in Germany in 1879. It is the world's largest industrial gas company by market share as well as revenue.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) - June production of goods made of polymers in Russia decreased, but in general the dynamics of production had a soft to stable character. The growth of the production of basic products from polymers since the the beginning of the year was 8.7%, as per MRC analysts.

According to the Russian Federal State Statistics Service, June production of plastic pipes, hoses and fittings grew to 51,100 tonnes, compared with 51,600 tonnes in May. Total production of plastic pipes, hoses and fittings was 250,400 tonnes in January-June, down 9.9% compared with the level in 2015.

June production of noncombined and reinforced films in Russia decreased to 79,900 tonnes, compared with 80,200 tonnes in May. Russia's production of films increased by 6.2% to 442,400 tonnes in the first six months of the year.

June production of plates and porous sheets reached 27,000 tonnes, compared with 24,300 tonnes a month earlier.
Total Russia's production of these products grew to 140,100 tonnes in January-June 2016, up 7.7% than a year earlier.

Production of plates, sheets and films of porous polymer in the past month amounted to 20,200 tonnes, compared to 20,800 tonnes in May. Russia's production of plates, sheets and films of porous polymer grew to 115,300 tonnes, up 3.4% year on year.

MRC