Solvay completes high-purity hydrogen peroxide plant in Germany

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Solvay says it has completed a production facility for high-purity hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) at the company’s Bernburg, Germany, site, according to Chemweek.

Product will be supplied to the electronics industry in Europe for the manufacture of semiconductor chips.

"Developments in society and technology in recent years have reinforced our belief that demand for our product can only grow," says Maik Diederich, business manager/EMEA at Solvay. "What is now obvious to everyone - especially after the recent impact of COVID-19 on our lives - is that our world is heading towards extensive digitalization in all areas: homeschooling, home office, Internet of Things, 5G, cloud computing, smart home, industry 4.0, and electromobility. The European semiconductor industry plays a crucial role in these developments."

The new production line incorporates innovations and benefits from the additional know-how acquired with the several H2O2 purification units that Solvay completed in Asia and Europe in recent years, the company says. Product from the new line has been qualified with Solvay’s main customers, it says.

As MRC informed earlier, in August, 2020, through the acquisition of the Solvay polyamide (PA) business, BASF enhanced its R&D capabilities in Asia Pacific with new technologies, technical expertise, and upgraded material and part testing services. BASF is planning to integrate the R&D centers from Solvay into its R&D existing facilities in Shanghai, China, and Seoul, Korea. The enhanced capabilities will boost BASF’s position as a solution provider to develop advanced material solutions for key industries.

We remind that 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.

Solvay is a science company whose technologies bring benefits to many aspects of daily life. With more than 24,100 employees in 64 countries, Solvay bonds people, ideas and elements to reinvent progress. The Group seeks to create sustainable shared value for all, notably through its Solvay One Planet plan crafted around three pillars: protecting the climate, preserving resources and fostering better life. The Group’s innovative solutions contribute to safer, cleaner, and more sustainable products found in homes, food and consumer goods, planes, cars, batteries, smart devices, health care applications, water and air purification systems. Founded in 1863, Solvay today ranks among the world’s top three companies for the vast majority of its activities and delivered net sales of EUR10.2 billion in 2019. Solvay is listed on Euronext Brussels (SOLB) and Paris and in the United States, where its shares (SOLVY) are traded through a Level I ADR program.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Global refiners are making more money for producing middle distillates such as gas oil and diesel now excess inventories accumulated during the first wave of the coronavirus epidemic have largely been absorbed, reported Reuters.

Despite the improvement, however, margins remain low in comparison with the last two decades, pressured by the continuing downturn in demand for jet fuel, which comes from a similar part of the refining process.

And margins are likely to remain depressed for several more months to keep capacity offline and restrict combined output of distillates and jet fuel, until travel restrictions are eased and international passenger aviation resumes.

Futures prices for US diesel made from WTI and delivered between June and December this year indicate gross margins of USD16-19 per barrel, up from USD9-11 before the successful vaccine trials were announced.

Equivalent margins for gas oil made from Brent and delivered in Northwest Europe have improved to USD7-9 per barrel, up from just USD4-5 before the first vaccine announcements.

But the gross gas oil margin is still only in the ninth percentile for all trading days since the start of 2004, leaving refineries under considerable pressure.

While global diesel and to a lesser extent gasoline consumption have bounced back since the second quarter of last year, jet use is still down by several million barrels per day.

The result is several million barrels per day of surplus refining capacity around the world, concentrated in refineries with the largest yield of middle distillates, most of them in Europe and Asia.

In the medium term, jet consumption is likely to recover to pre-epidemic levels, re-absorbing much of the excess refinery capacity.

Larger, more modern and more efficient refineries will therefore ride out the slump and wait for the next cyclical upturn once passenger aviation resumes.

But some smaller, older and less efficient refineries, many of which were only marginally profitable through the cycle before the epidemic, may not be able to sustain losses in the meantime.

The pandemic is testing their resilience, winnowing out the weaker assets, and resulting in permanent closures, conversions to import terminals, or sales to operators willing to accept lower margins long term.

As MRC informed before, in early November 2020, Royal Dutch Shell announced it was closing its refinery in Convent, Louisiana, the largest such US facility and first on the US Gulf Coast to shut down since the coronavirus pandemic devastated worldwide demand.

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.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Exxon Mobil Corp has begun restarting the hydrocracker at its 560,500 barrel-per-day (bpd) Baytown, Texas, refinery, shortly after restarting a crude distillation unit (CDU), said sources familiar with plant operations, said Hydrocarbonprocessing.

The 135,000-bpd Pipestill 7 CDU was the first to restart since the Baytown refinery was shut on Feb. 15 by the effects of severe cold weather. The 25,000-bpd hydrocracker produces diesel and other motor fuels. “Exxon Mobil continues to make progress restarting its Baytown operations,” said company spokesman Jeremy Eikenberry.

Pipestill 7 is the second largest of the refinery’s three CDUs, which break down crude oil into hydrocarbon feedstocks for all other production units. Hydrocrackers use a catalyst in the presence of hydrogen under high heat and pressure to convert gas oil into diesel and other motor fuels.

As MRC wrote before, ExxonMobil's recent operational shutdowns include polyethylene (PE) facilities amid power outages prompted by the deep freeze that has enveloped the US Gulf Coast. "This event has caused widespread power outages across Texas and Louisiana" Feb. 15," the letter, dated Feb. 16, said. "As a consequence, several ExxonMobil Chemical operations have experienced loss of power and other key utilities, impacting our ability to resume full operations." ExxonMobil operates three PE units in Mont Belvieu, Texas, with combined capacity of 880,000 mt/year, according to S&P Global Platts Analytics.

Exxon is among many petrochemical producers that shut Feb. 14 and subsequent days because of sustained extreme sub-freezing temperatures in the region. ExxonMobil previously confirmed Feb. 16 that the company had shut all refining and chemical operations at its Baytown and Beaumont, Texas, complexes. Ethylene produced at Baytown feeds the Mont Belvieu PE operations.

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.

ExxonMobil is the largest non-government owned company in the energy industry and produces about 3% of the world"s oil and about 2% of the world's energy.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- As oil majors and developed nations push for a faster transition to clean energy, much of Latin America is struggling just to cover its basic supply needs for fossil fuels, which is forcing some countries to actually rely more on dirty energy sources, said Hydrocarbonprocessing.

Experts speaking at this year’s all-virtual CERAWeek conference said a portion of Latin America could fall behind in the energy transition due to outdated policies and resource nationalism in nations like Venezuela and Mexico, combined with an urgent need for cheap imported fuel. “In this moment, when the energy transition is being accelerated by large oil firms and governments amid political pressure, Europe and now the United States are taking the lead through carbon neutralization measures. I don’t see policies as aggressive in this region,” Decio Oddone, CEO of Brazil’s oil and gas producer Enauta S.A. told Reuters.

In 2018, Latin American nations combined emitted as much carbon dioxide (CO2) as Russia, the world’s fourth-largest CO2 emitter, according to International Energy Agency data. The region’s imports of motor fuels, natural gas, fuel oil and diesel for power generation have risen consistently, interrupted only by the coronavirus pandemic that sapped fuel demand worldwide.

Last year, Latin America imported 2.69 million barrels per day (bpd) of crude and refined products from the United States, its largest source of oil imports, according to a Reuters analysis of U.S. Energy Information Administration data. The 2020 volume represented a 12% decline from the record 3.05 million bpd in 2019, but still up 88% from a decade earlier.

Last month’s deep freeze in Texas knocked out natural gas supply to Northern Mexico, leaving households without electricity and forcing hundreds of factories to slow down or close. That has motivated the Latin American country’s government to return to coal and fuel oil for power generation.

In February, Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador ordered state power company Comision Federal de Electricidad (CFE) to reopen thermoelectrical plants set for dismantling, while questioning the country’s dependence on U.S. natural gas as the primary fuel for electricity. “CFE has important investment plans today, but they do not include renewables, power transmission or distribution,” Tania Ortiz, CEO of Mexico’s energy company IEnova, said at the CERAWEeek conference, organized by IHS Markit.

As MRC informed previously, oil producers face an unprecedented challenge to balance supply and demand as factors including the pace and response to COVID-19 vaccines cloud the outlook, according to an official with International Energy Agency's (IEA) statement.

We remind that the COVID-19 outbreak has led to an unprecedented decline in demand affecting all sections of the Russian economy, which has impacted the demand for petrochemicals in the short-term. However, the pandemic triggered an increase in the demand for polymers in food packaging, and cleaning and hygiene products, according to GlobalData, a leading data and analytics company. With Russian petrochemical companies having the advantage of access to low-cost feedstock, and proximity to demand-rich Asian (primarily China) and European markets for the supply of petrochemical products, these companies appear to be well-positioned to derive full benefits from an improving market environment and global economy post-COVID-19, says GlobalData.

We also remind that in December 2020, Sibur, Gazprom Neft, and Uzbekneftegaz agreed to cooperate on potential investments in Uzbekistan including a major expansion of Uzbekneftegaz’s existing Shurtan Gas Chemical Complex (SGCC) and the proposed construction of a new gas chemicals facility. The signed cooperation agreement for the projects includes “the creation of a gas chemical complex using methanol-to-olefins (MTO) technology, and the expansion of the production capacity of the Shurtan Gas Chemical Complex".

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.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- BASF will power the first plants of its Guangdong Verbund site in Zhanjiang, Guangdong province, using 100% renewable electricity, as per the company's press release.

This came as a significant step for BASF to build its Guangdong Verbund site as a role model for sustainable production. With the first plant to be operational by 2022, the first plants will produce engineering plastics and thermoplastic polyurethanes (TPU) to serve the increasing needs of various growth industries in the South China market and throughout Asia.

In order to maximize the use of renewable electricity for the first plants, as early as the end of 2019, BASF pioneered to propose a new concept of Renewable Direct Power Purchase (R-DPP), and together with China Resources Power, actively supported Guangdong province in the development of the Renewable Electricity Marketization Policy.

“Sustainability is firmly anchored in our corporate strategy, and we are aiming to grow CO2-neutrally by 2030,” said Dr. Markus Kamieth, member of the Board of Executive Directors, BASF SE. “The strong engagement to promote the development of this new Renewable Electricity Marketization Policy will enable our new Verbund site in Zhanjiang to play an important role in BASF’s edging closer to our sustainability goals.”

“Through the pioneering effort in research and development of this completely new R-DPP concept, BASF has been proactively supporting the development of the Renewable Electricity Marketization Policy in Guangdong province,” said Dr. Klaus Welsch, President, Mega Projects Asia, BASF. “This will not only ensure the application of 100% renewable electricity in the first plants, but will also maximize the use of renewable electricity for the production of our whole Verbund site. Hence, we will be able to minimize the carbon footprint of ‘Made in Zhanjiang’ products and bring added value to our customers.”

With the active promotion under various parties, on February 26, 2021, Guangdong Development and Reform Commission issued the Pilot Implementation Plan of the Province’s Renewable Electricity Consumption Guarantee. Based on the requirements from this Implementation Plan, Guangdong Power Exchange Center will develop the Renewable Electricity Trading Rules Policy to provide guidance for the renewable electricity trading throughout the province. And BASF is expected to be the first user to purchase renewable electricity under the new trading rules policy.

“It demonstrates our continuous commitment to the sustainable development in Zhanjiang. By collaborating with local partners and the local community, we will bring forward more initiatives on carbon reduction and circular economy in the near future, thereby contributing to China’s carbon reduction goal,” added Haryono Lim, Senior Vice President, Senior Project New Verbund Site China, BASF, and General Manager, BASF Integrated Site (Guangdong) Co. Ltd.

Announced in July 2018 and officially commenced in November 2019, BASF Guangdong Verbund site will be the company’s largest investment with around USD10 billion upon completion and would be operated under the sole responsibility of BASF. The site would ultimately be the third-largest BASF site worldwide, following Ludwigshafen, Germany, and Antwerp, Belgium. The whole Verbund site is planned to be completed by 2030.

We remind, as MRC reported earlier, that 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.
MRC