Supply of PP into Ukraine grew by 4% in Q1

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Imports of polypropylene (PP) into Ukraine rose by 4% n the fist three months of 2017 year on year, totalling about 28,400 tonnes. Imports of all grades of PP increased, with the exception of PP random copolymers, according to MRC DataScope.

March PP imports to Ukraine, despite export restrictions from some European and Middle Eastern producers, increased to 10,300 tonnes against 9,800 tonnes a month earlier. Overall imports of propylene polymers increased to 28,400 tonnes in January-March 2017, compared to 27,300 tonnes a year earlier. PP block copolymer accounted for the greatest increase in imports, whereas demand for statistical copolymers of propylene (PP random copolymer) decreased.

Structure of PP supplies over the reported period looked as follows.

March imports of homopolymer PP into the country remained practically at the February level at about 7,800 tonnes. A limited supply of PP in Europe and the Middle East, Ukrainian companies offset by the growth in the supplies from Russia. Overall shipments of homopolymer PP reached 22,200 tonnes in the first three months of 2017 versus 21,200 tonnes a year earlier.

March imports of PP block copolymers into the country increased to 1,100 tonnes, compared with 800 tonnes in February. Local companies increased imports of pipe and injection moulding grade PP block copolymers. Imports of PP block copolymers into the country were about 2,900 tonnes in January-March, compared with about 2,500 tonnes year on year. Local pipes producers accounted for the greatest increase in demand.

March imports of PP random copolymers into Ukraine increased to 1,200 tonnes, compared with 923 tonnes in February; local companies significantly increased their imports of pipe grades PP. Overall imports of PP random copolymers reached 2,300 tonnes in January-March, whereas this figure was slightly over 3,000 tonnes a year earlier.

Overall imports of other propylene copolymers were about 581 tonnes over the stated period.

MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- ONGC Petro additions Ltd (OPaL) is seeking to sell 50% stake in its USD4.6 bln facility, likely to Saudi Aramco, as per sources in livemint.com, after talks with a unit of Kuwait Petroleum Corp. about investing in the project stalled last year, reported Plastemart.

Oil & Natural Gas Corp. (ONGC), which owns the biggest stake in OPaL, entered into a preliminary cooperation agreement in January 2014 with Petrochemical Industries Co., a subsidiary of state-owned Kuwait Petroleum. Talks between OPaL and PIC about the Kuwaiti company investing in the Indian project stalled last year, according to the people. OPaL hosted a team from Saudi Aramco at its plant in Gujarat last month, they said.

Saudi Aramco, which is the biggest supplier of crude oil to India, has shown interest in a proposed 60 million tonnes-a-year refinery and petrochemicals project being planned by Indian state refiners on the nation’s west coast, oil minister Dharmendra Pradhan said on 30 March.

As MRC informed before, in late 2016, OPaL started up its cracker in India. Located at Dahej in the western India state of Gujarat, the cracker has an ethylene production capacity of 1.1 million mt/year and propylene production capacity of 400,000 mt/year.

OPaL is a joint venture of Oil and Natural Gas Corp. (ONGC - 26%), Gas Authority of India Limited (GAIL - 17%) and Gujarat State Petroleum Corp. (GSPC - 5%), with the balance held by other investors and public shares.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- South Korean chemical manufacturer Lotte Chemical Titan, a subsidiary of the South Korean Lotte Group, has clarified that the new investment of a petrochemical plant worth USD4 billion in Cilegon, Banten, would be carried out by its sister company Lotte Chemical Indonesia, as per Plastemart.

Lotte Chemical Titan president director Yoon Sungku made the clarification, following media reports that wrongly said that the new project would be run by his company.

"Lotte Chemical Titan engages in the business of trading polyethylene and polypropylene, while our subsidiary Lotte Chemical Titan Nusantara engages in the business of producing and selling polyethylene," Yoon said.

He stressed that Lotte Chemical Titan and Lotte Chemical Titan Nusantara had nothing to do with activities of the new plant in Cilegon. However, he added that the new plant would produce ethylene which might fulfill the feedstock requirement of Lotte Chemical Nusantara in producing polyethylene, he said.

"The plant which is being built on 45 hectares of land can produce 1 million tons of ethylene per year," Yoon said. He later explained that Lotte Chemical Indonesia was not listed on the Indonesia Stock Exchange (IDX) as the firm’s stocks were mostly owned by its parent company, Malaysia’s Lotte Chemical Titan Group.

According to a statement, Lotte Chemical Indonesia is 99.998% owned by Malaysia’s Lotte Chemical Titan and the remaining percentage by Lotte Chemical Singapore, another subsidiary of Malaysia’s Lotte Chemical Titan.

As MRC reported earlier, in mid-April, Lotte Chemical Titan unexpectedly shut its No. 1 and 2 naphtha-fed steam crackers at Pasir Gudang (Malaysia) on Tuesday due to an interruption of water supplies. The No. 1 cracker can produce 260,000 m tpa of ethylene and 160,000 m tpa of propylene while the No. 2 cracker can make 407,000 m tpa of ethylene and 260,000 m tpa of propylene. The No. 2 cracker had just completed a planned turnaround from February 6 to March 29.

Lotte Chemical Titan produces Malaysia's most comprehensive portfolio of olefins and polyolefins which contribute to the enhancement of everyday life. Lotte Chemical Titan's production site in Malaysia consists of eleven process facilities, two co-generation plants and three tank farms. They are located on 2 sites in Pasir Gudang and Tanjung Langsat in the state of Johor. In 2006, Lotte Chemical Titan acquired PT Lotte Chemical Titan Nusantara, Indonesia’s first and largest polyethylene plant in the country. This acquisition boosted the polyolefins capacity by approximately 50%, thus making the company one of the largest producers in South East Asia. Lotte Chemical Titan was acquired by Lotte Chemical Corp., forming part of the Lotte conglomerate of Korea, in 2010. The company thus became one of Lotte Chemical Corp.’s largest overseas subsidiaries.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Petroliam Nasional Bhd (Petronas) has signed the engineering, procurement, construction and commissioning (EPCC) contract for Pengerang Integrated Complex (PIC)’s Flexible High-Density Polyethylene (Flexi HDPE) plant, as per Plastemart.

Petronas said it signed the contract with the Chinese consortium of Tecnimont S.p.A, China Huanqiu Contracting and Engineering Co Ltd, TECNIMONTHQC S.c.a.r.l and TecnimontHQC Sdn Bhd.

The Flexi HDPE plant is the first of its kind in Petronas and Malaysia, utilising the Hostalen Advanced Cascade Process Slurry Technology for Multi-modal HDPE, licensed by Lyondellbasell. The plant, with 400,000 metric tpa capacity, would produce a range of multimodal HDPE products, complementing Petronas’ polyethylene portfolio, upon completion.

The Flexi HDPE, produced in the form of pallets, enables custom-made production of very-high-molecular-weight polymers desirable for end-products such as pressure pipes for drinking water, gas, industrial and general purposes, as well as household containers and bottles.

As MRC informed before, in November 2015, Petronas Chemicals Group Bhd awarded a USD482m contract to build a polypropylene (PP) plant at its new world-scale RAPID refining and petrochemicals site in Malaysia. The engineering, procurement, construction and commissioning contract was awarded to Italy’s Technimont and China’s Huanqiu Contracting & Engineering.

Petronas, short for Petroliam Nasional Berhad, is a Malaysian oil and gas company wholly owned by the Government of Malaysia. The Group is engaged in a wide spectrum of petroleum activities, including upstream exploration and production of oil and gas to downstream oil refining; marketing and distribution of petroleum products; trading; gas processing and liquefaction; gas transmission pipeline network operations; marketing of liquefied natural gas; petrochemical manufacturing and marketing; shipping; automotive engineering; and property investment.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Reliance is executing major projects in its energy and materials chain at Jamnagar covering Para-Xylene, Cracker complex along with downstream plants and Gasification, said the company on its site.

Jamnagar is one the largest contemporary project sites globally with some of the largest and most complex process units ever built anywhere in this industry. These projects will add significant value to Reliance’s Refining & Petrochemical business and enable Jamnagar complex to achieve energy self-sufficiency.

The benefits of integration at the Jamnagar complex will set a new paradigm of scale and value addition in the Refining and Petrochemicals industry.

Para-Xylene, Cracker and downstream projects (MEG, Linear Low density and Low density Polyethylene) as well as Gasification which is linked to RIL’s DTA refinery, have now been installed, mechanically complete and are in various stages of pre-commissioning and commissioning.

Reliance is pleased to announce the successful and flawless commissioning of the second and final phase of Para-xylene (PX) comprising of PX Crystallizers trains, Trans-alkylation and Aromatic Extraction units at Jamnagar.

Earlier in December 2016, RIL had announced successful commissioning of the first phase comprising Train 1 of PX plant. Train 2 as part of second phase has been commissioned earlier this month and the last Train 3, is at an advanced stage of commissioning and will begin production later this quarter.

This plant is built with state-of-the-art crystallization technology from BP which is highly energy efficient. With the commissioning of this plant, RIL’s PX capacity will be more than double. Reliance will emerge as the world’s second largest producer of PX with about 11% of global production.
MRC