Mitsui Chemicals completed production expansion for ultra-high molecular weight PE

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Mitsui Chemicals, Inc. has expanded production facilities to manufacture HI-ZEX MILLION ultra-high molecular weight polyethylene in response to growing demand for automotive and industrial batteries, as per Hydrocarbonprocessing.

This action boosts the company's production capacity for HI-ZEX MILLION by about 15% to 8,500 tons per year.

Mitsui Chemicals developed HI-ZEX MILLION through the application of the company’s proprietary technology in catalysts and processes, giving this ultra-high molecular weight polyethylene an average molecular weight of up to 6 million. Due to the material's excellent chemical resistance, abrasion resistance, impact resistance and self-lubrication, it is used in diverse fields such as lithium-ion battery separators, industrial materials and medical devices.

Furthermore, HI-ZEX MILLION retains a consistent shape and provides excellent solubility. With these properties helping to streamline customers' fabrication processes, the product has been certificated Mitsui Chemical's Blue Value.

Positioning HI-ZEX MILLION as a strategic product in the key business domain of mobility, Mitsui Chemicals will continue to be proactive in further strengthening and expanding this business.

As MRC wrote before, in March 2016, Mitsui & Co., Ltd. and Hankuk Carbon Co., a company listed on the Korea Exchange, entered into a strategic alliance agreement to engage in collaborative business activities relating to the processing of composite materials.

Mitsui Chemicals is a leading manufacturer and supplier of value added specialty chemicals, plastics and materials for the automotive, healthcare, packaging, agricultural, building, and semiconductor and electronics markets. Mitsui Chemicals is a Japanese Chemicals company, a part of the Mitsui conglomerate. The company has a turnover of around 15 billion USD and has business interests in Japan, Europe, China, Southeast Asia and the USA. The company mainly deals in performance materials, petro and basic chemicals and functional polymeric materials.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Arkema has announced a project to increase its linear mercaptans production capacities to support the demand growth of polymers for transportation and electronics markets, as per the company's press release.

This incremental investment would increase the Houston (Texas) plant’s manufacturing capacity by up to 30%.

"Arkema is the world’s leading producer of mercaptans and other sulfur derivatives, and this investment would further strengthen that position. The expansion would position us to better serve our customers’ needs and support their growth," said Frederic Vartician, Global Group President of Thiochemicals.

The total new capacity should come online in the first half of 2020.

As MRC informed before, in March 2017, Arkema completed the sale to INEOS of its 50% stake in Oxochimie, their oxo alcohols manufacturing joint venture, and of the associated business.

Arkema is a leading European supplier of chlorochemicals and PVC. Kynar and Kynar Flex are registered trademarks of Arkema Inc.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Karpatneftekhim (Kalush, Ivano-Frankivsk region), Ukraine's largest petrochemical plant, took off-stream its production of high density polyethylene (HDPE) and polyvinyl chloride (PVC) for maintenance, according to ICIS-MRC Price report.

The plant's clients said the scheduled turnaround at HDPE and PVC production capacities started on 5 November and it will be quite long. Karpatneftekhim plans to resume its HDPE production on 4 December and PVC production - a few days later.

This is virtually the first shutdown for maintenance after a period of more than a year of the plant's operations.

As reported earlier, Karpatneftekhim resumed operations on 9 June 2017, after a five-year outage.

Karpatneftekhim is one of the largest enterprises of Ukraine's petrochemical complex. Currently, the plant can produce annually 300,000 tonnes of PVC, 200,000 tonnes of caustic soda, about 180,000 tonnes of chlorine, as well as 250,000 tonnes of ethylene and 100,000 tonnes of polyethylene.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- The joint venture Uz-Kor Gas Chemical, established by the National Holding Company Uzbekneftegaz and the investment consortium of Korean companies - Kogaz, Lotte Group and STX Energy, resumed its production of polymers after the turnaround, according to ICIS-MRC Price Report with reference to the plant's customers.

The plant's clients said Uz-Kor Gas Chemical began to gradually resume work on 1 November after the scheduled maintenance at its high density polyethylene (HDPE) and polypropylene (PP) production capacities. One of two reactors for HDPE production was launched in the morning of 2 November.

The outage started in early October and should be completed by 27 October. But due to technical problems, the turnaround was extended by almost a week.

As MRC reported earlier, Uz-Kor Gas Chemical was founded on the basis of Ustyurt Gas Chemical Comples (Surgil deposit). The total cost of the project is over USD4 billion. The complex provides processing of 4.5 billion cubic meters of natural gas and includes HDPE and PP production facilities with the annual capacity of 386,000 and 80,000 tonnes, respectively.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) - India's Petronet LNG and ONGC Videsh are jointly in talks about buying a stake in Tellurian Inc's proposed Driftwood project in Louisiana, Petronet's managing said Hydrocarbonprocessing.

"We have moved slightly forward (from the preliminary discussion stage)... we are evaluating it seriously and we are in serious discussion with them," Prabhat Singh told Reuters in a phone interview. India is expanding its pipeline network and building new liquefied natural gas (LNG) import terminals to boost use of the cleaner fuel in the country.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has set a target to raise the share of natural gas in India's overall energy mix to 15 percent in the next few years from about 6.5 percent at present. Petronet is India's top gas importer with no experience of the upstream business, which is why it is tying up with ONGC Videsh, the overseas investment arm of Indian oil producer Oil and Natural Gas Corp.

"We want confirmation and confidence of upstream ... we want to mitigate geological risk," Singh said. ONGC Videsh's managing director N. K. Verma declined to comment when asked by Reuters.

Singh, however, said that Petronet was also in talks with several other players about buying a stake in assets spanning from drilling to dispensing, saying it was a bold step for the firm.

"But this a step which will deliver gas at cheap prices to India on a longer-term basis. It has merit in this, let us see how things shape up," he said.

A USD500 million investment in Driftwood would give the stakeholder rights over a one million tonne/year of LNG over the life of the project, according to a presentation by Tellurian posted on the U.S. company's website.

On a free-on-board basis gas will cost USd4.5 per million British thermal units. Tellurian hopes to deliver the first LNG to partners in 2024, the presentation said. "We are negotiating on the contours offered by them (Tellurian)," Singh said.
MRC