Shell eyes major Pernis oil refinery turnaround to start in early May

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Royal Dutch Shell said it is planning a major maintenance turnaround at its Pernis oil refinery in the Netherlands starting on May 4, 2020, reported Reuters.

A video posted on the company’s Dutch website said the major maintenance will take place in May and June and involve cleaning towers and heat exchangers as well as replacing others.

The major maintenance means Shell will not have to do another maintenance of the same scale for another 3 to 6 years at the refinery, which is Europe’s largest with a capacity to process 404,000 barrels per day of crude.

As MRC informed previously, Shell Singapore restarted its naphtha cracker in Bukom Island this week following a two months maintenance shutdown since the beginning of October 2019. Thus, this cracker was taken off-stream for the turnaround on 1 October 2019. The cracker is able to produce 960,000 tons/year of ethylene and 550,000 tons/year of propylene.

Ethylene and propylene are feedstocks for producing polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP).

According to MRC's ScanPlast report, Russia's estimated PE consumption totalled 2,093,260 tonnes in 2019, up by 6% year on year. Shipments of all PE grades increased. PE shipments rose from both domestic producers and foreign suppliers. The estimated PP consumption in the Russian market was 1,260,400 tonnes in January-December 2019, up by 4% year on year. Supply of almost all grades of propylene polymers increased, except for statistical copolymers of propylene (PP random copolymers).

Royal Dutch Shell plc is an Anglo-Dutch multinational oil and gas company headquartered in The Hague, Netherlands and with its registered office in London, United Kingdom. It is the biggest company in the world in terms of revenue and one of the six oil and gas "supermajors". Shell is vertically integrated and is active in every area of the oil and gas industry, including exploration and production, refining, distribution and marketing, petrochemicals, power generation and trading.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- China National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC) is lowering crude oil throughput this month at a refinery in south China by about 8% from the original plan as the coronavirus cuts demand for its refined fuel, a company source said, as per Hydrocarbonprocessing.

The 240,000 barrels per day (bpd) plant in Huizhou, Guangdong province, will process about 220,000 bpd in February, the source, who has direct knowledge of the plant’s operations, told Reuters.

CNOOC did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment.

The decision to cut output was made on Tuesday as CNOOC started to receive feedback from its refined fuel customers that demand was falling faster than expected because of the spread of coronavirus.

The cut at a similar level will be extended into March, said the source, who declined to be named as he is not authorised to talk to the press.

At the same site, CNOOC has kept operations at another 200,000-bpd capacity refinery unchanged at 70% utilisation, the source added.

Reuters reported on Monday that China’s Sinopec, Asia’s top refiner, has lowered its throughput this month by around 12% in the steepest cut in more than a decade and independent refineries in east China’s Shandong have reduced operations by 30%-50%.

As MRC informed earlier, China National Offshore Oil Corp. and Shell International Petroleum Company Ltd. signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) to explore their existing collaboration and the development of petrochemical manufacturing facilities at the Nanhai site in Huizhou, Guangdong province.

Ethylene and propylene are feedstocks for producing polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP).

According to MRC's ScanPlast report, Russia's estimated PE consumption totalled 2,093,260 tonnes in 2019, up by 6% year on year. Shipments of all PE grades increased. PE shipments rose from both domestic producers and foreign suppliers. The estimated PP consumption in the Russian market was 1,260,400 tonnes in January-December 2019, up by 4% year on year. Supply of almost all grades of propylene polymers increased, except for statistical copolymers of propylene (PP random copolymers).
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- PPG Industries Inc. (Pittsburgh, Pa) announced that it has reached a definitive agreement to acquire Alpha Coating Technologies, LLC (Alpha), a manufacturer of powder coatings for light industrial applications and heat sensitive substrates, said Chemengonline.

The transaction is expected to close in the first quarter of 2020, subject to customary closing conditions. Financial terms were not disclosed.

Founded in 2000, Alpha focuses on the development, manufacture and sale of powder coatings for light industrial applications; medium density fiberboard and heat sensitive substrates; and toll manufactures powder coatings for metal and light industrial applications. Alpha employs approximately 35 people at its operations in West Chicago, Illinois.

"Alpha’s best-in-class service, technology and quick turnaround color matching capabilities will be a strategic complement to PPG,” said Kevin Braun, PPG vice president, Industrial Coatings, Americas. “We are pleased to welcome Alpha into the PPG family and continue providing our customers with outstanding products and services."

As MRC wrote previously, Russia's output of chemical products dropped by 3.2% in November 2019 month on month. However, production of basic chemicals increased by 3.6% in the first eleven months of 2019, according to Rosstat's data. According to the Federal State Statistics Service of the Russian Federation, the largest increase in production volumes on an annualized basis accounted for mineral fertilizers and polymers in primary form. Last month, 255,000 tonnes of ethylene were produced versus 210,000 tonnes in October; by November, Russian producers had completed all their scheduled works. Thus, 2,721,000 tonnes of this olefin were produced in January-November 2019, up by 0.3% year on year.

Ethylene is the main feedstock for the production of polyethylene (PE).

According to MRC's ScanPlast report, Russia's estimated PE consumption totalled 2,093,260 tonnes in 2019, up by 6% year on year. Shipments of all PE grades increased. PE shipments rose from both domestic producers and foreign suppliers.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- A hearing to finalize Philadelphia Energy Solution’s bankruptcy plan and consummate a sale of the company’s refinery to a real estate developer was pushed back along with a deadline for objections to the deal, reported Reuters with reference to federal court filings.

The plan is now scheduled to go before the United States Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware to be finalized on Feb. 12 instead of Thursday. The deadline for objections was extended two days to Wednesday.

No official reason was given for the rescheduling and PES did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

PES last month entered into an agreement to sell its refinery, the largest and oldest on the East Coast, to Chicago-based Hilco Redevelopment Partners, which is expected to use the site largely for warehousing. Los Angeles developer, Industrial Realty Group, was selected as a backup buyer.

Several groups, including the union that provided hundreds of workers to the plant, have objected to the bankruptcy plan, citing lacking information about how PES would settle all of its debts.

The US Trustee, a bankruptcy watchdog within the Department of Justice, has also objected. The trustee said in a filing PES cannot release itself from its more than USD1 billion in debts and other obligations under the plan because it will be liquidating its assets instead of restructuring or selling its business.

PES shut its refinery and filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in July following a fire that destroyed a section of its 335,000 barrel-per-day plant near downtown Philadelphia. More than 1,000 full-time and contract workers, many whom are now creditors in the bankruptcy case, were laid off.

One key unresolved issue is who, if anyone, will receive proceeds from up to USD1.25 billion in insurance coverage tied to the blaze.

PES’s unsecured creditors have publicly opposed the sale to Hilco, and union representatives held protests against the deal.

The group is pushing for a sale to Industrial Realty Group, which has been in conversations about leasing part of the site to Phil Rinaldi, the former chief executive of PES who wants to restart the refinery.

Ethylene and propylene are feedstocks for producing polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP).

According to MRC's ScanPlast report, Russia's estimated PE consumption totalled 2,093,260 tonnes in 2019, up by 6% year on year. Shipments of all PE grades increased. PE shipments rose from both domestic producers and foreign suppliers. The estimated PP consumption in the Russian market was 1,260,400 tonnes in January-December 2019, up by 4% year on year. Supply of almost all grades of propylene polymers increased, except for statistical copolymers of propylene (PP random copolymers).
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- US imports of polyethylene terephthalate (PET) resin totaled 806,242 metric tons in 2019, down by 14.8% from 2018, according to the latest US Commerce Department data, said Chemweek.

The 2019 imports are equivalent to approximately 42,444 truckloads or 10,608 railcars.

The imports, comprising bottle-grade and high-viscosity PET resin, were valued at USD953 million in 2019, down from USD1.2 billion in 2018.

Much of the resin is used to produce single-use plastic bottles, containers and packaging. It is also used in production of strapping tape and fibers to make home furnishing items such as pillows.

Imports last year came from 43 countries. They were down by 33% from Mexico, the top PET source, at 25% of the 2019 total. They were up sharply from several countries, including Vietnam, the third highest source of imports last year, and Egypt, the fourth highest.

PET imports fell in 2019 due to rising use of recycled PET pellets and flake as consumer brand companies vow to use more of the material in the manufacture of bottles, containers and packaging.

As per MRC's DataScope, imports of injection moulding PET chips in Russia increased by 13% in 2019 compared with the same period a year ago and reached 126,600 tonnes. The same indicator in January-December 2018 amounted to 111,700 tonnes, according to MRC"s ScanPlast. The share of imports from China of bottled PET remained at the level of the previous year and amounted to 87% in January - December 2019.
MRC