Pemex may delay call for joint ventures

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Mexico's state-run Pemex could delay a call to energy companies to form joint ventures planned for October, amid government complaints that these firms have not invested quickly enough to make good on the promises of the country's flagship reform, reported Hydrocarbonprocessing with reference to the energy secretary.

Pemex so far has had mixed results in its strategy of finding foreign partners to form joint ventures. In 2016, BHP Group was chosen to partner with Pemex in the country's flagship offshore project Trion. But some later auctions failed to attract oil companies and others were delayed.

Oil firms have only invested USD800 million out of billions of dollars committed to over a hundred new Mexican energy projects, Rocio Nahle told journalists at the end of a meeting with the U.S. and Canadian energy secretaries at CERAWeek by IHS Markit conference in Houston.

"They must comply with what the law says in terms of timelines, otherwise they will have to return (licenses and contracts)," Nahle said.

Mexico's government is under pressure to boost the country's oil output and strengthen Pemex following a long-standing production decline that reduced the oil firm's crude output to 1.62 million barrels per day (bpd) in January, below the 2019 target. Crude exports were 1.07 million bpd.

Pemex pumps almost all oil barrels produced in the country, but following the country's opening of its energy markets, authorities expect foreign firms to contribute with more barrels as fast as possible to ease the energy trade deficit.

"Pemex has its own project of drilling 116 wells. As that project develops, it will decide if farmouts (joint ventures between Pemex and foreign partners) will be called this year or next," the secretary added.

Low refining rates increasingly also are forcing Pemex to import over 800,000 bpd of gasoline and other refined products, according to official data, even as the government strives to minimize fuel theft.

As MRC wrote previously, Mexican national oil company Pemex is currently processing about 9 percent more crude oil at its domestic refineries than it did in 2017, said Chief Executive Officer Carlos Trevino in April 2018.

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).
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Total and several partners along the construction value chain have decided to associate to form the Clean Site Circular Project which aims at recycling natural shrink hoods wastes from the construction sector in closed system without film performances degradation, as per the company's press release.

Shrink hoods are films used for protection and stabilization of goods during storage and transport on pallets.

It has already been demonstrated that a closed loop ‘shrink hood to shrink hood’ is industrially feasible and technically equivalent to virgin solutions. The film recipe has been developed by Total. It requires the use of Total Lumicene Supertough 22ST05 as "booster" for the recyclates in order to match the demanding market requirements.

The Clean Site Circular Project, coordinated by Valipac, brings together key actors along the value chain:

Morssinkhof Rymoplast, which produces high quality recyclates from collected shrink hoods;
Total Polymers, which has developed the film recipe and the "booster" for the recyclates;
Oerlemans Packaging, which produces shrink hood films;
Wienerberger, which uses the shrink hoods for their pallets of building materials;
Valipac, which implemented the Clean Site System 15 years ago for the collection of wrapping films on construction sites;
Fema, which represents the building material actors in Belgium.

Through Fema, the project members intend to spread over this success story to the construction market in Europe.

As MRC informed before, in December 2017, Total inaugurated the new units at its Antwerp integrated refining & petrochemicals platform, which had progressively started up in the previous few months.

Total S.A. is a French multinational oil and gas company and one of the six "Supermajor" oil companies in the world with business in Europe, the United States, the Middle East and Asia. The company's petrochemical products cover two main groups: base chemicals and the consumer polymers (polyethylene, polypropylene and polystyrene) that are derived from them.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Fluor Corporation announced that its joint venture with TechnipFMC has successfully completed its engineering, procurement and construction management services scope of work on Sasol’s world-scale petrochemical complex in Westlake, Louisiana.

The joint venture will continue to provide assistance to the Sasol team with remaining activities by working with Sasol in parallel on transition plans for each unit and system. The joint venture team will also assist in performance testing for the complex.

A 1.5-million-ton-per-year ethane cracker is at the heart of the complex, which also includes six downstream chemical units and associated utilities, infrastructure and offsites.

"This milestone is the culmination of nearly seven years of hard work by Fluor’s project team and we are proud to have successfully delivered our scope," said Mark Fields, president of Fluor’s Energy & Chemicals business in the Americas. "We brought our extensive U.S. Gulf Coast construction and megaproject expertise using our integrated solutions approach, and we are proud of the lasting positive impact this project will have on Southwest Louisiana."

Beginning in November 2018, Fluor’s joint venture began incremental transitions of assets from the joint venture to Sasol upon mechanical completion of each unit or system. All units have been transitioned to Sasol except for the low-density polyethylene unit, which will be handed over by the end of March 2019.

The project achieved first steam in August 2018. Utilities to support the early process units were fully operational by the end of November 2018 and the linear low-density polyethylene unit achieved beneficial operations in February 2019.

More than 6,000 staff and craft were on site at peak to build the complex, which use the ethylene produced by the cracker to manufacture high-value chemicals that are used in everyday consumer products. The project team strengthened and widened more than two miles of roadway in the community to support the completion of more than 500 heavy haul transports to the project site.

The Fluor joint venture integrated a team of 30 main construction contractors and worked in collaboration with Sasol to strengthen the local economy, with more than $4 billion committed to Louisiana businesses. AMECO, Fluor’s equipment division, provided construction equipment to various subcontractors onsite.

The joint venture also invested in the local community by contributing more than USD185,000 to local schools and charitable organizations throughout the project.

Founded in 1912, Fluor Corporation (NYSE: FLR) is a global engineering, procurement, fabrication, construction and maintenance company that transforms the world by building prosperity and empowering progress.

MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Equate Petrochemical Company has restarted its styrene monomer (SM) plant at Shuaiba, according to Apic-online.

A Polymerupdate source in Kuwait informed that that the company has resumed operations at the plant late last week. The plant was shut for maintenance on Janauary 12, 2019.

Located at Shuaiba in Kuwait, the SM plant has a production capacity of 450,000 mt/year.

As MRC informed before, Kuwait-based Equate Petrochemical Company continued its global growth through its wholly owned subsidiary MEGlobal with the launch of work on a new world-scale ethylene glycol (EG) manufacturing facility in Freeport, Texas, US, in August 2016. With this plant, Equate is the first Kuwaiti petrochemical company to invest in the US. The new facility, to be completed during 2019, will increase Equate’s monoethylene glycol (MEG) capacity by 750,000 metric tonnes annually and will enhance the company’s global presence to meet customer needs.

Equate is the world’s second largest EG producer with 12% of the global market share.

Equate Petrochemical Company K.S.C.C., together with its subsidiaries, manufactures, markets, and distributes petrochemical products. The company produces ethylene, polyethylene terephthalate, polypropylene, styrene monomer, paraxylene, heavy aromatics, and benzene; polyethylene for various applications, including flexible and food packaging, industrial packaging, agricultural films, HIC, and others; and monoethylene and diethylene glycol that are used in polyester fiber for fabrics, water-based adhesive materials, shoe polish, and printer inks, as well as automotive anti-freeze and coolants. The company sells its products in Kuwait and other Gulf Cooperation Council countries, North America, Asia, Europe, and internationally. Equate Petrochemical Company K.S.C.C. was founded in 1994 and is headquartered in Safat, Kuwait.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- ELIX Polymers will present latest developments in its portfolio of chrome-platable ABS-based materials at PIAE, the Plastics in Automotive Engineering congress in Mannheim, Germany on April 3 and 4, said the company.

Once again at this leading annual industry event, ELIX will have its own stand – Booth 99 – where it will show its product portfolio and new innovations.

The company recently commissioned a study to compare its ELIX Ultra HH4115PG platable ABS/PC (an ABS modified with polycarbonate) with the benchmark platable product under Volkswagen specification TL528-B. The tests, carried out at the Kunststoff-Institut Ludenscheid, produced similarly very good results for both materials; each showed adhesion values clearly over the requirements. The plastics institute carried out a roll peeling test (DIN 53 494), climate change tests (PV 1200) and a cross-cut test (TL528). But while the test results are similar, ELIX Ultra HH4115PG is 3% less dense, it has better flow properties, and can be processed at lower temperatures. ELIX Polymers will have full details of the test results available on its stand.

ELIX Polymers’ ELIX ABS P2MC, a benchmark platable ABS in Europe, is already approved at many OEMs and is used by customers around the world. A high-heat version, ELIX ABS HHP2MC, was launched in 2016. For applications where even higher temperature resistance or impact strength is required, Ultra HH4115PG offers advantages over grades of PC modified with ABS in terms of processability, lightweighting and costs.

All three grades have special formulations dedicated to electroplating process requirements. To ensure Class A surfaces, the company has put in place a process of intensive quality control and selection of intermediate products. ELIX Polymers is now developing a new platable ABS/PC with even better flow, for very demanding parts.

Approvals for ELIX UltraHH4115PG have been achieved at Renault-Nissan (PMR2019), Daimler (DBL 5404.AA77), and General Motors (GMW15581P-ABS + PC-T7). More approvals are in the process of being obtained.

ELIX Polymers is cooperating with the main producers of plating chemicals as it develops resins optimized for use with chromium 6-free technologies (inhaled chromium 6 – also known as hexavalent chromium – is a human carcinogen), in order to ensure that plated plastic parts continue to have the highest possible quality. ’'It is important that all involved parties – plating chemistry producer, resin producer, Tier, OEM – all work together in the early development phase,” says Fabian Herter, Marketing Manager Automotive & ABS Specialties.

Last November, ELIX Polymers participated in the “Chrome 2030 – the future of plating on plastics in the Automotive Industry” conference organized by “Fachverband Galvanisierte Kunststoffe (FGK) in Stuttgart, where the latest authorisation status, experience of alternative chromium conditioning and plating systems, progress results and technology comparisons were all discussed.
MRC