Cosmo Films launches heat resistant films

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Cosmo Films, a global leader in speciality films for flexible packaging, lamination and labeling applications as well as synthetic paper has introduced BOPP based heat resistant (HR) films, as per the company's press release.

The films have been engineered to work as printing layer replacing BOPET film in multi-layer laminates for various packaging applications in both food and non-food segments.

The new heat resistant films are clear, non-heat sealable and both sides treated films with excellent printability and go mostly for reverse printing. The thermally stable films have excellent slip properties and good machinability and therefore work well on high speed FFS packaging machines. Available in 15, 18, 20 microns; the films are well suited for both adhesive as well as extrusion lamination and offer good lamination bond.

The company has also launched a barrier version of the film. The transparent BOPP based barrier HR film has excellent oxygen barrier properties and offers OTR of less than 100cc/m2/day. The film has good grease resistance that comes in handy for oily snack food packaging; which is a big application area of this film.

Speaking on the development, Mr. Pankaj Poddar, CEO Cosmo Films said, "Homogeneous structures are becoming increasingly preferable as recyclability of multilayer packaging becomes need of the hour. Polypropylene structures or even Polypropylene plus Polyethylene structures are better placed from recyclability perspective because they belong to the same polymer family. Cosmo Films with more than 100 years of collective OPP experience now stands in an advantageous position to develop specialised polypropylene films aimed at a sustainable future".

As MRC reported earlier, in March 2017, Cosmo Films commenced a new line of production of biaxially-oriented polypropylene (BOPP) films. The new line ihas a capacity of 60,000 tpa, which enhanced the company’s overall capacity by 4%.

Established in 1981, Cosmo Films is a global leader in speciality films used for packaging, laminating and labeling applications. Its films offerings include bi-axially oriented polypropylene (BOPP) films, cast polypropylene (CPP) films and soon to be offered bi-axially oriented polyethylene terephthalate (BOPET) films. Today, the company is the largest exporter of BOPP films from India and also a largest producer of thermal laminating films in the world with plant cum distribution centres in the U.S, Korea & Japan. We also have global channel partners in more than 70 countries which helps us service our valued customers across the globe.

Hengyi pushes back Brunei refinery start-up to Q2 2019

MOSCOW (MRC) -- The start-up a refinery-petrochemical project in Brunei by China’s Hengyi Industries International Pte Ltd will likely be delayed by a few months to the second quarter of next year, four industry sources said, as per Hydrocarbonprocessing.

The project, at Brunei’s Muara Besar island and which includes a 175,000-barrels-per-day (bpd) refinery, was expected to be mechanically completed by end-2018, with operations slated for the first quarter of next year.

Construction is now expected to be finished by the first quarter of 2019, with the first crude oil cargo to be delivered to the plant at the end of that period, one of the sources said. Reasons for the delay were not immediately clear, but new refineries often face start-up delays.

Trial runs at the crude distillation unit (CDU) will start around April-May and operation could begin in the second or third quarter of next year, the source said.

Hengyi Industries International plans to import Middle East crude for the refinery’s first cargo, although this will largely depend on economics at the time of importing, the source said.

The company is the trading arm of privately-run Chinese company Hengyi Group, which is a major synthetic fiber producer in China and owns Shenzhen-listed Hengyi Petrochemical.

The Brunei refinery-petrochemical project will produce gasoline, diesel and jet fuel, the sources said. It will not produce any fuel oil for export. Hengyi Petrochemical did not respond to a request for comment.

The Brunei complex also houses an aromatics plant that will make 1.5 million tonnes per year (tpy) of paraxylene and 400,000 tpy of benzene.

The refinery plans to export oil products to customers in Asia, but it will also have to compete with other new refining projects in the region, including the USD27 billion Refinery and Petrochemical Integrated Development (RAPID) complex in Malaysia, which is jointly owned by Malaysia’s Petronas and Saudi Aramco.

RAPID is also aiming for start-up next year.
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Qatar Petroleum in talks over potential German LNG terminal

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Qatar Petroleum (QP), the world’s top supplier of liquefied natural gas (LNG), is talking to German energy firms Uniper and RWE about cooperating on a potential local LNG terminal, its chief executive told Reuters.

"We have a serious interest in participating in a German LNG terminal and are talking to Uniper and RWE," Saad Al-Kaabi told business daily Handelsblatt in an interview ahead of the Qatar Germany Business and Investment Forum in Berlin on Sept. 7.

Al-Kaabi said there were two ways of participating in an LNG terminal, either by securing capacity to open up supply, or by taking a stake in the terminal infrastructure.

"The builders of the terminal will have to think about which option they want, and we have to decide what suits us best," he said.

A spokeswoman for RWE, Germany’s largest power producer, said talks with Qatar Petroleum were about potential gas deliveries to Germany, not about a shareholding in a potential German LNG terminal.

Germany, Europe’s largest energy consumer, shelved plans for an LNG terminal of its own a few years ago, with major operators participating in foreign projects - including Rotterdam’s Gate terminal - instead.

However, talks about installing an LNG terminal have been revived in the wake of increasingly dynamic global flows of the fuel and discussions about its use in shipping to meet looming requirements for cleaner fuels.

A consortium comprising Dutch gas network operator Gasunie, German tank storage provider Oiltanking and Dutch oil and chemical storage company Vopak, is currently trying to get such a project off the ground.

A funding decision by the consortium, dubbed German LNG Terminal, expected by the end of 2019.

Some policymakers favor LNG as a way of reducing Europe’s dependence on gas from Russia, which is pressing ahead with its Nord Stream 2 pipeline.

Uniper said it has repeatedly pointed out that a German LNG terminal would be beneficial in light of declining gas resources in Europe, adding that Qatar Petroleum subsidiary, Qatargas, had been a strategic partner for years.

"We are in constant contact with them. Such discussions are, of course, confidential," the group said.

As MRC wrote before, in July 2017, QP successfully completed the integration of Qatar Vinyl Company (QVC) into Qatar Petrochemical Company (Qapco), six months before the deadline of last year end.
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Mexican president-elect sets out plan for new USD8B oil refinery

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Mexico’s next government plans to build what could be the country’s largest oil refinery, with construction set to begin as soon as next year, as per Hydrocarbonprocessing with reference to president-elect Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador.

The winner of July’s presidential election is seeking to end Mexico’s massive fuel imports, nearly all of which come from the United States, while boosting domestic refining during the first half of his six-year term.

While his aides have provided some details on the plans, Lopez Obrador himself has mostly spoken in general terms and had not previously provided numbers.

"It will be a refinery that will produce 400,000 barrels per day of gasoline with an approximate cost of USD8 billion that we want to build in three years," Lopez Obrador told a group of business leaders in the northern city of Monterrey, in broadcast comments.

Mexico’s largest refinery at present is the 330,000-barrel-per-day Salina Cruz, owned and operated by state-run oil company Pemex in the southern state of Oaxaca.

It was not clear if Lopez Obrador was referring to the planned refinery’s crude processing capacity or its gasoline production. Two aides did not respond to requests for comment.

Salina Cruz, like Pemex’s other five refineries, has recently been producing far below capacity due to accidents and operational problems, as well as Pemex’s focus on maximizing the value of its oil even if that means refining less domestically.

Mexico’s refining network can process up to 1.6 million bpd of crude. It has been working this year at around 40 percent.

Rocio Nahle, Lopez Obrador’s pick to be the next energy minister, told Reuters in February that the next government wanted to add crude processing capacity of between 300,000 and 600,000 bpd.

Lopez Obrador has previously said the new refinery will be built in Dos Bocas, Tabasco, along Mexico’s southern Gulf coast.

"The commitment is to produce gasoline in Mexico," Lopez Obrador said on Tuesday. "We want to produce gasoline because we have the raw material, we have crude oil."

He added the project launch will happen "in the first days" of his government. He takes office in December.

Mexico produces about 1.84 million bpd of crude, more than 60 percent of which is exported, while it imports over 1 million bpd of refined products, including gasoline and diesel, according to U.S. and Mexican government data.

In July, Pemex’s six domestic refineries produced about 213,000 bpd of gasoline.

As MRC informed earlier, in November 2015, Fluor Corp. announced that ICA Fluor, its industrial engineering and construction joint venture with Empresas ICA, had signed a contract with Pemex to supply detail engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) services for the utilities and offsites that are part of the Tula refinery upgrade at Hidalgo, Mexico. The total contract value is USD1.1 billion.

Pemex, Mexican Petroleum, is a Mexican state-owned petroleum company. Pemex has a total asset worth of USD415.75 billion, and is the world's second largest non-publicly listed company by total market value, and Latin America's second largest enterprise by annual revenue as of 2009. Company produces such polymers, as polyethylene (PE), polypropylene (PP), polystyrene (PS).
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BP concerned over planned merger of Polish two biggest refineries

MOSCOW (MRC) -- The planned merger of Poland’s two largest refiners PKN Orlen and Grupa Lotos could restrict competition in the east European country, reported Reuters with reference to BP's statement.

Poland’s biggest oil refiner PKN Orlen said in February it planned to buy at least a 53 percent stake in Lotos, mostly from the state.

London-based oil and gas group BP has not filed any official complaint with Polish or European Union authorities but will consider its options in the future, a company spokeswoman said.

"If this merger were to go ahead, 95 percent of the (country’s supply and infrastructure) market would be controlled by two companies," the BP statement said.

"We believe that a competitive market is in the best interest of Polish consumers and that this merger could restrict that competition unless there is a guaranteed competitive cost of supply and infrastructure access."

In the first half of 2018, PKN Orlen owned 1,771 petrol stations in Poland, BP had 537 stations and Lotos 484, according to data from POPiHN, a Polish organization that provides research into local fuel market.

"We are in a dialogue with the European Commission. According to our analyses, the transaction will not threaten the competition," a PKN Orlen spokeswoman said.

PKN plans to ask the European Commission later this year for anti-monopoly approval of the deal.

As MRC informed before, British oil and gas company BP will increase investment in the United States after the lowering of tax rates under President Donald Trump, Chief Executive Bob Dudley said in early February 2018. BP invested USD90 billion in the United States over the past decade, excluding USD65 billion in fines and clean up costs over the 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster, making it the country's biggest investor in the energy sector.
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