MOSCOW (MRC) -- BASF has announced prices increases in North America for formic acid, neopentylglycol, select polyetheramines, and 1,4-butanediol (BDO) and its derivatives, reported Chemweek.
The price of all grades of formic acid has been raised by 5 cents/pound (cts/lb), effective immediately or as existing contracts permit, it says. Prices for BDO and its derivatives gamma-butyrolactone and n-methylpyrrolidone, meanwhile, will rise by 15 cts/lb as of 1 April, or as contracts allow. Prices will also be increased by 20 cts/lb for tetrahydrofuran and polytetramethylene ether glycol, also as of 1 April.
BASF says prices for three of its polyetheramine products in North America will also rise, effective 1 April or as contracts permit, by 30-38 cts/lb. The polyetheramine products are used mainly for the processing and curing of epoxy resins in various coating applications and sealing compounds.
The price of neopentylglycol, meanwhile, has been increased in the Americas, also effective 1 April or as allowable. BASF says it will hike its price for all grades of the polyalcohol in North America by 27 cts/lb, and in South America by $595/metric ton.
BASF announced a price rise on 1 March for BDO and its derivatives in Europe.
As MRC wrote before, in mid-February, BASF said it was restarting one of its steam crackers at its Ludwigshafen complex in Germany after operations were halted last Wednesday due to a technical issue. The naphtha cracker produces ethylene and propylene, and is one of two crackers on the site. One has a production capacity of 420,000 metric tons/year, with the other’s capacity at 240,000 metric tons/year, according to IHS Markit data.
Ethylene and propylene are feedstocks for producing polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP).
According to MRC's ScanPlast report, Russia's estimated PE consumption totalled 2,220,640 tonnes in 2020, up by 2% year on year. Only shipments of low density polyethylene (LDPE) and high density polyethylene (HDPE) increased. At the same time, polypropylene (PP) shipments to the Russian market reached 1 240,000 tonnes in 2020 (calculated using the formula: production, minus exports, plus imports, excluding producers' inventories as of 1 January, 2020). Supply of exclusively PP random copolymer increased.
BASF is the leading chemical company. It produces a wide range of chemicals, for example solvents, amines, resins, glues, electronic-grade chemicals, industrial gases, basic petrochemicals and inorganic chemicals. The most important customers for this segment are the pharmaceutical, construction, textile and automotive industries.
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