Russian production of household refrigerators in January fell by 15.8%

MOSCOW (MRC) - Russian production of household refrigerators and freezers in January 2020 amounted to 146 thousand units, which is 15.8% lower than manufactured products for the same period in 2019 and 24.1% lower than a month earlier, in December 2019, the Federal State Statistics Service (Rosstat) said in a statement on the production of certain types of plastic products for January 2020.

According to the agency, the index of production of rubber and plastic products in January compared with January 2019 increased by 7.3%, but decreased by 15.9% compared to December.

In January, 270 thousand units were produced of household washing machines, as a result, the decrease was 11.1% compared to the same period last year, and compared to the December indicator, the production of washing machines fell by 31.4%.

Furniture in plastic materials was manufactured in the amount of 48.1 thousand pieces in January, which is 4.7% lower than the January figure of 2019, but higher than furniture production in December by 12.3%.

It was previously reported that due to an outbreak of coronavirus, the global average utilization of chemical capacities decreased in January by 1.1% to 81.3%. Last January, the production load was 83.2%, the average figure from 1987 to 2017 - 86.5%.

The total global production of chemical products grew by 0.9% in January 2020 compared to last year. The industrial production index is calculated by the types of activities "Mining", "Manufacturing", "Production and distribution of electricity, gas and water" based on data on the dynamics of production of the most important representative goods (in kind or in value terms). The structure of gross value added by type of economic activity of the 2008 base year is used as weights. Adjusted for informal activities.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) - SIBUR will develop a feasibility study for the construction of a gas processing plant near Kazan by July 2020, Kommersant writes.

Based on the feasibility study, the company's shareholders will decide on the construction of the enterprise.

Leonid Alekhin, senior project manager of SIBUR Holding, does not disclose the proposed location of the enterprise, production volumes and final products. "There are gas pipelines through which gas can be supplied to the gas processing plant. The plant will start to extract ethane from the pipeline gas mixture and a wide fraction of light hydrocarbons - the most valuable raw materials for gas processing. Shareholders will decide what to do with NGL, whether to divide it into fractions or not, and ethane should “Dry gas will be returned to the pipeline and will be used later," he said.

SIBUR is the leader of the Russian petrochemical industry and one of the largest global companies in the sector with more than 23 thousand employees. In 2019, SIBUR's revenue amounted to USD8.2 billion, EBITDA - USD2.6 billion.

Over the past 10 years, SIBUR has implemented a number of large-scale investment projects worth about 1 trillion rubles. Every year, the company directs at least 70% of EBITDA to finance the investment program, while maintaining a balanced debt burden.

Earlier it was reported that SIBUR Holding on March 25 will early pay off bonds of the 12th series for 10 billion rubles. In particular, SIBUR Holding PJSC decided to early repay the 12th series bonds in the amount of 10 billion rubles, the company said. The repayment will take place on March 25, at the end date of the 7th coupon period.

SIBUR Holding PJSC is the largest petrochemical company in Russia and Eastern Europe with full coverage of the industry cycle from gas processing, production of monomers, plastics and synthetic rubbers to plastics processing. The main shareholder of SIBUR Leonid Mikhelson controls 48.48% of the company, Gennady Timchenko - 17%, Kirill Shamalov - 3.88%, the current and former management of the company (including SIBUR chairman of the board Dmitry Konov and head of Gazprom Neft Alexander Dyukov) - 10.6%, Chinese Sinopec and the Silk Road Fund - 10% each.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- PBF Energy said a fire that occurred at one operating unit at its Delaware City, Delaware, refinery on Wednesday has been extinguished and two employees are being treated for injuries, reported Reuters.

According to energy intelligence service Genscape, the fire is believed to have occurred at the 182,200 barrel-per-day refinery’s alkylation unit.

The refinery was expected to shut its alkylation unit in February-March 2020 for maintenance, according to a source familiar with the plant’s operations.

The company said the fire was reported around 1:40 p.m. EDT and all employees and contractors have been accounted for.

The cause of the fire was unknown and an investigation will be conducted, PBF said in an emailed response.

"Ambulances, medics and two medevac helicopters responded to the scene for reported injuries," said a local media report.

A Delaware Department of Transportation (DelDOT) camera showed "thick, black smoke with embedded flames shooting from the ground and also from a nearby smokestack," according to the report.

As MRC wrote before, US refiner PBF Energy has completed its acquisition of Shell’s 157,000 bbl/day Martinez refinery near San Francisco, California. The USD1bn deal, agreed in June 2019, was completed effective 1 February 2020.

We also remind that Shell Singapore restarted its naphtha cracker in Bukom Island in early December 2019, 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 215,390 tonnes in the first month of 2020, up by 23% year on year. Shipments of all grades of high density polyethylene (HDPE) and linear low density polyethylene (LLDPE) increased due to higher capacity utilisation at ZapSibNeftekhim. At the same time, PP shipments to the Russian market were 127,240 tonnes in January 2020, up by 33% year on year. ZapSibNeftekhim's homopolymer PP accounted for the main increase in shipments.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Operations at Italian petrochemical producer Versalis have not affected by emergency quarantine measures in the country, reported S&P Global with reference to a company spokesperson's statement Thursday.

Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte extended its emergency coronavirus measures Wednesday evening and announced the closure of "non-essential" commercial businesses. This follows the announcement of a nationwide lockdown on Monday, limiting movement for around 60 million people. Under these measures people will only be allowed to leave their homes for work or health reasons.

Factories can operate as long as safety protocols are in place, Conte told a press conference.

"Versalis (Eni) confirms that operations are being carried on regularly. Since the emergency outbreak, the company has promptly put in place all necessary measures to protect its personnel's health," the company told S&P Global Platts in a statement.

"The progress of the epidemic is being monitored in order to continue to guarantee maximum health and safety protection of all employees," the statement continued.

Versalis has three steam crackers in Italy, capable of producing 1.675 million mt of ethylene, 750,000 of propylene and 285,000 mt of butadiene a year.

As MRC informed earlier, Versalis shut its cracking unit in Priolo, Sicily, for repairs in the last days of December, 2019. The capacity of the cracking unit at this complex is 490,000 tonnes of ethylene and 130,000 tonnes of propylene per year. The maintenance works lasted until February 2020. Loading at this cracker was reduced in November and December 2019.

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

According to MRC's ScanPlast report, Russia's estimated PE consumption totalled 215,390 tonnes in the first month of 2020, up by 23% year on year. Shipments of all grades of high density polyethylene (HDPE) and linear low density polyethylene (LLDPE) increased due to higher capacity utilisation at ZapSibNeftekhim. At the same time, PP shipments to the Russian market were 127,240 tonnes in January 2020, up by 33% year on year. ZapSibNeftekhim's homopolymer PP accounted for the main increase in shipments.

Versalis is a petrochemical company, a 100% subsidiary of the Italian oil and gas company Eni SpA. The company produces a wide range of petrochemical products, and is also one of the world's leading elastomer companies.
Eni spa (Ente Nazionale Idrocarburi) is an Italian oil and gas company headquartered in Rome. Eni operates in 70 countries.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Saudi Arabia’s SHARQ, or Eastern Petrochemical Company, has resumed operations at its No.4 monoethylene glycol (MEG) plant, according to Polymerupdate.

A Polymerupdate source in Saudi Arabia informed that, the company brought on-stream this plant following a maintenance turnaround in early March 2020. The plant was shut on February 6, 2020.

Located at Jubail in Saudi Arabia, the No. 4 MEG plant has a production capacity of 700,000 mt/year.

As MRC reported earlier, SHARQ shut its high density polyethylene (HDPE) and linear low density polyethylene (LLDPE) lines for a two-month turnaround in January 2020. Located in Al Jubail, Saudi Arabia, each of the two PE lines has a production capacity of 400,000 tons/year. The precise duration of the shutdown was not available at the time of press.

PTA is used to produce polyethylene terephthalate (PET), which is used in the manufacturing of plastic bottles, films, packaging containers, in the textile and food industries.

As per MRC's ScanPlast report, Russia's PET consumption increased in January 2020 by 9% year on year. Totally Russia recycled 55,390 tonnes of PET chips in January (these data do not take into account the shipment of Russian material to the countries of the Customs Union).
MRC