Clariant and Floreon announce collaboration to expand high-performance biopolymer applications to additional markets

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Clariant’s Additives business and Floreon-Transforming Packaging Limited announce an exciting new collaboration to further extend the performance properties and market potential of biopolymers, whilst preserving their environmental benefits, as per the company's press release.

By integrating the benefits of Clariant’s additives with Floreon’s proprietary material solutions, the collaboration aims to open up additional possibilities for plastic manufacturers and brand owners to consider biopolymers as a viable, low carbon footprint alternative to fossil-based plastics for both single-use and durable applications. Markets set to benefit from the new enhanced grades include rigid and flexible Packaging, Electrical & Electronic equipment (E&E), Hygiene products, Consumer goods and Automotive.

Floreon develops and markets proprietary compounds based on PLA and containing 70-90% renewable, plant-based raw materials, thus containing carbon sequestered from the atmosphere by plants. They are typically mechanically tougher than traditional PLA and can deliver significant energy savings in processing. Floreon compounds are recyclable and they can also be composted via industrial composting. That makes Floreon’s materials viable for applications where, at this stage, contamination with food waste and organic matter make mechanical recycling unfeasible.

Clariant’s industry-leading portfolio of sustainable additives includes a wide range of bio-based additives, which reliably deliver both high performance and sustainability to the plastics value chain. Introduced at the K 2019 Plastics Trade Fair under the Exolit® OP Terra, Licocene® Terra and Licocare® RBW Vita trade names, they help to reduce fossil resource intensity and enable more sustainable material choices. Clariant’s experts will support the Floreon development team to enhance the performance possibilities and processing characteristics of bioplastics.

The scope of benefits is vast. Examples include achieving less energy use and faster cycle times by increasing the processing efficiency or adding completely new properties to the material. Product manufacturers will have the possibility to tailor compounds to suit specific processing technologies and applications, including in some cases those where bioplastics have so far not been able to meet the challenges of demanding conditions or environments.

Shaun Chatterton, CEO, Floreon-Transforming Packaging Limited, said: "Brand owners and plastic converters are seeking more sustainable material solutions to offer their customers, driven by goals ranging from recyclable solutions and improving waste management to lowering carbon footprint and reducing resource use. Floreon can really contribute towards these goals. As a small business, our team is very excited to be able to take the benefits of biopolymers to new heights by drawing on Clariant’s extensive capabilities in developing additives focused on the performance needs of the plastics industry. Floreon has the potential to transform not just packaging but many industries, and we expect to launch our first product from this collaboration into market during the first half of 2020."

Stephan Lynen, Head of Business Unit Additives, Clariant, commented: "We are excited to be working together with Floreon using the advantages of our range of sustainable additives to close the performance gap between biopolymers and other materials. This is just another way we can contribute to giving the plastics value chain a greater choice of options for meeting sustainability targets and consumer demands, and in doing so, support the transformation to a circular economy. For society, our environment, and future generations, it is our responsibility to continuously improve sustainability performance and reduce carbon footprint and waste."

Clariant’s collaboration with Floreon constitutes together with Clariant’s EcoCircle, a corporate-wide initiative supporting the transition from a one-way plastics value chain to a circular plastics economy, another step forward to jointly develop new circular materials and technologies together with partners from the entire value chain to enable a circular economy.

As MRC reported earlier, in early March 2020, Sabic announced that it has purchased additional shares in Clariant, increasing its holding in the company from 24.99% to 31.5%.

We remind that SABIC Europe, an affiliate of SABIC, conducted a maintenance work at its cracker No.3 at Geleen site in the Netherlands last autumn. The planned maintenance started in September and lasted around 2 months. The company operates two steam crackers in Geleen which are capable of producing 1,250,000 tons/year of ethylene and 675,000 tons/year of propylene in total.

Earlier last year, SABIC took off-stream its SABIC Olefins 4 cracker owing to technical issues on May 10, 2019. Further details on duration of the shutdown could not be ascertained. Located in beek, the Netherlands, the cracker has an ethylene production capacity of 690,000 mt/year and a propylene production capacity of 360,000 mt/year.

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.

Clariant AG is a Swiss chemical company and a world leader in the production of specialty chemicals for the textile, printing, mining and metallurgical industries. It is engaged in processing crude oil products in pigments, plastics and paints.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Trading house Glencore has chartered the 3 million barrel crude carrier ‘Europe’ to store oil at sea for at least 6 months, reported Reuters with reference to trading sources' statement.

The vessel is one of two so-called ultra large crude carriers (ULCC), the largest tankers in the world.

Glencore booked the vessel at a rate of USD37,000 a day for the first six months, according to the sources.

A Glencore spokesman declined to comment.

Sources told Reuters last week that Royal Dutch Shell had provisionally booked at least three supertankers to store crude oil at sea for at least three months as traders brace for a sharp rise in global stocks after OPEC and its allies abandoned a production cut deal.

Each of these vessels can each carry a maximum of two million barrels of oil.

The glut of oil in world markets has prompted efforts by oil players to find storage options including both on land and offshore on tankers.

As MRC reported earlier, 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) - California's largest oil refinery began cutting production on Wednesday as the push to end the spread of coronavirus destroyed demand for motor fuels in the Los Angeles area, according to sources familiar with plant operations, said Hydrocarbonprocessing.

Marathon Petroleum Corp MPC.N expects to make a dramatic cut in production at its Los Angeles Refinery, the sources said, to bring costs in line with reduced demand. The exact amount of the planned cut was unknown on Wednesday night.

A Marathon spokesman was not immediately available for comment on Wednesday night.
The 363,000 barrel-per-day (bpd) refinery, located in two adjoining plants in the Los Angeles suburbs of Carson and Wilmington, was the first U.S. refinery to report a coronavirus infection.

An employee at the refinery tested positive for the virus and, along with those who worked close by, went into quarantine on March 11.

On Wednesday, Marathon told California environmental regulators it was utilizing the safety flare system at the refinery, indicating a change in the level of production. The safety flare system is used to burn off excess hydrocarbons when units are shut or malfunction.

Marathon maintained regular production in the week after the worker went into quarantine.

The coronavirus has infected more than 200,000 people worldwide and over 8,700 of those have died. In the United States, more than 8,000 people have been infected and over 150 people have died.

As MRC wrote previously, a portion of Marathon Petroleum Corp’s 363,000 barrel-per-day Carson refinery in California was shut in late February 2020, following a fire.

We also remind that the gasoline-producing unit at Marathon Petroleum Corp’s 585,000-barrel-per-day (bpd) Galveston Bay Refinery in Texas City, Texas, remained shut for six weeks for repairs in late Juney-early August 2019. The 140,000-bpd gasoline-producing Fluidic Catalytic Cracking Unit 3 (FCCU 3) was shut on June 29 2019 to repair a leak. The refinery’s 65,000 bpd reformer, called Ultraformer 4, was also shut down.

Propylene is the main feedstock for the production of polypropylene (PP).

According to MRC's ScanPlast report, 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) -- Russia’s Moscow Refinery, owned by oil producer Gazprom Neft, has launched a new crude oil processing unit with an annual capacity of 6 million tons, said Eco-petrol.

The unit, which was launched on March 16, would allow the refinery to maintain oil processing levels which otherwise were on track to fall by 600,000 tonnes next month due to planned maintenance works, the sources said.

Gazprom Neft did not immediately reply to a Reuters request for comment.

As MRC informed earlier, Gazprom Neft and the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC) have entered into a Framework Agreement on Strategic Cooperation. The companies will explore opportunities for implementing joint projects in the upstream and downstream sectors, as well as in information technologies, artificial intelligence, and other areas.

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.

Gazprom Neft is a vertically integrated oil company, primarily involved in oil and gas exploration and production, refining, and the production and sale of oil products. The Gazprom Neft’s corporate structure comprises more than 70 production, refining and sales subsidiaries throughout Russia, the CIS, and abroad.
The company’s proved and probable reserves (SPE-PRMS) are estimated at 2.78 billion tonnes of oil equivalent (btoe), making Gazprom Neft one of the top-20 largest oil and gas companies in the world, and one of Russia’s top three largest companies in terms of production and refining volumes. Total production in 2017 reached 89.75 million tonnes of oil equivalent (mtoe), with refining volumes of 40.1 million tonnes.
Gazprom Neft products are exported to more than 50 countries worldwide, and sold throughout the Russian Federation and abroad. The company’s filling station network totals more than 1,850 outlets throughout Russia, the CIS and Europe.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Hungarian producer MOL announced Wednesday a small oil and gas discovery in the Norwegian North Sea, reported S&P Global.

Preliminary evaluation of the main discovery in license 820S showed recoverable resources of 12 million-71 million barrels of oil equivalent with light oil at API 40 gravity, MOL said.

The discovery was successfully tested producing a combined oil and gas maximum flow rate of 3,463 boe/d due to limited by surface equipment, MOL said.

The main borehole and two sidetracks were drilled in 126 meters of water to a maximum depth of 2,652 meters below sea level. MOL also discovered smaller volumes of oil and gas in several other formations.

Norway, MOL's biggest exploration target, is where the company spent USD58 million across several offshore exploration licenses last year.

The latest discovery was "consistent with MOL's stated strategy of replenishing reserves through a combination of exploration and acquisitions," the company said.

MOL said it will now initiate a commercial feasibility evaluation phase, assessing the need for further appraisal wells, and looking at development options including a timeline for first production.

The 820S license, located 200 km west of Stavanger, is operated by MOL Norge with a 40% working interest, alongside Lundin Norway (40%), Wintershall Dea Norge (10%) and Pandion Energy (10%).

As MRC informed earlier, MOL Petrochemicals Company (formerly known as TVK, part of the MOL Group), the only Hungarian producer of olefins and polyolefins, on 23 September announced force majeure on the supply of polypropylene (PP) from plant No. 4 at the petrochemical complex in Tiszaujvaros (Tiszaujvaros, Hungary).

According to MRC's ScanPlast report, 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.

MOL Hungarian Oil and Gas PLC is an integrated oil and gas company. The Company produces crude oil, petroleum products, bitumens, lubricants and natural gas. MOL owns and operates refineries, oil and gas pipelines, service stations, and natural gas storage facilities.
MRC