European Council endorses EU sustainable chemicals strategy

MOSCOW (MRC) -- The European Council has endorsed the EU's chemicals strategy for sustainability, adopted by the EU Commission in October 2020, reported Chemweek.

The council has directed the commission to implement the actions laid down in the strategy, including targeted amendments to streamline EU chemicals legislation, substituting and minimizing substances of concern, and phasing out the most harmful chemicals for non-essential societal uses. The chemicals strategy is an essential part of the EU Green Deal and its zero-pollution ambition, as well as a key component in the EU recovery plan from the COVID-19 crisis.

The council acknowledges in its conclusions that achieving the objectives and vision of the EU chemicals strategy for sustainability requires changes to relevant legislation, including the Registration, Evaluation, Authorisation, and Restriction of Chemicals (REACH) and Classification, Labeling, and Packaging (CLP) regulations. As a result, it supports the announced amendment of REACH in a targeted manner, accompanied by a comprehensive impact assessment, to ensure that the changes will not weaken REACH or lower the level of protection already accomplished, or affect the rights of EU Member States to initiate and influence actions taken under the regulation.

The council says it also endorses the EU in taking a leading role globally by promoting its rules on chemicals as the 'golden standard,' as well as ensuring that the EU has secured access to chemicals that are critical for health and the functioning of society.

Separately, Germany’s chemical industry association VCI (Frankfurt) has raised concerns over the effects it says the implementation of the chemical strategy will have for the chemical and pharmaceutical industry and its customers in downstream industrial value chains, if it is implemented unchanged.

“The EU chemicals strategy is characterized by a regulatory approach that is heavily based on the hazardous properties of chemicals. This could mean that entire groups of substances could be banned from the market, regardless of whether their use actually poses a risk. The strategy does not take sufficient account of the fact that substances with hazardous properties can also be handled safely and are indispensable for many everyday applications,” VCI says.

As MRC informed before, demand and supply growth for naphtha in European markets is likely to be moderate until at least the second quarter of 2021 as inventories are run down and deployment of a COVID-19 vaccine starts to make some headway in reviving oil products demand, according to IHS Markit analysts.

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.
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TPC restarts Port Neches terminal, signs C4 tolling agreement

MOSCOW (MRC) -- TPC Group (Houston, Texas) says its Port Neches, Texas, terminal is receiving butadiene and delivering it to major area customers, said Chemweek.

The terminal is also receiving rail and marine deliveries of crude C4s. The developments complete the second phase of a three-phase startup of the terminal, which was significantly damaged by a November 2019 explosion and fire that destroyed much of the Port Neches facility’s crude-C4 processing capability. TPC also says it has signed a C4-processing agreement with a third-party toll processor.

TPC has estimated that reconstruction of the production assets will take up to five years. “We are pleased with the progress we continue to make on reestablishing butadiene, crude C4, and raffinate terminalling capabilities at the Port Neches site,” says Ed Dineen, TPC Group president and CEO.

TPC says it will use its logistic and storage facilities as well as commercial agreements for feedstock and product sales to supply crude C4s for processing to the tolling firm, which will return finished butadiene and raffinate products to TPC Group for distribution.

“This agreement provides us access to significant capabilities to consume our committed crude C4 volumes as well as meet the requirements of our long-term butadiene product sales agreements,” says Charlie Graham, senior vice president/commercial at TPC.

As per MRC, TPC stopped producing BD and other products at its Port Neches, Texas, site in November 2019 following a fire. There are currently no known plans to rebuild the production lines, and the site is being used as a logistics and storage hub. TPC had CC4 offtake agreements in place, and the new agreement with BTP will allow the company to consume those volumes and meet long-term finished product sales agreements, the company said in the release. BTP's nameplate BD capacity is 410,000 tonnes/year.

Butadiene is the main feedstock for the production of ABS.

According to the ICIS-MRC Price Report, last year ABS imports to Russia increased by 4% compared to 2019 and amounted to 35 thousand tons against 33.7 thousand tons. The share of South Korean supplies amounted to 62% (21.6 thousand tons) against 58% (19.7 thousand tons) in January-December 2019.

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Dow signs MoU to establish South China Specialties Hub

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Dow signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Zhanjiang Economic and Technological Development Zone Administrative Committee (Zhanjiang EDZ) to build the Dow South China Specialties Hub, a multi-year project providing customers local access to Dow’s portfolio of high value products and innovative technologies, said Hydrocarbonprocessing.

"Asia Pacific is the world’s largest chemicals market. Demands in the region are evolving towards high-value, specialty chemicals that help customers meet rapidly-developing megatrends in mobility, urbanization and sustainability,” said Jon Penrice, Dow Asia Pacific president. “The establishment of the Dow South China Specialties Hub would further position Dow to provide industry-leading materials science solutions to continue to grow with our customers in China and throughout the entire region."

The new manufacturing hub would extend Dow’s local reach, further enhancing supply reliability, responsiveness to market needs and customized innovation, and better positions customers for success in markets including automotive, pharmaceuticals, cleaning chemicals, apparel, lubricants and adhesives. Aligned to Dow’s focus on low capital intensive, fast payback and high return growth projects, under the MOU the Company would invest approximately USD250 million to construct specialty polyurethanes and alkoxylates facilities, with a total product capacity of approximately 250,000 tons. The site also offers opportunity for future development and expansion at the Specialties Hub.

Henry Ling, vice president of operations, Dow Asia Pacific, said, “The South China Specialties Hub will be built to Dow’s world-class environmental, health and safety standards and aligned to Dow’s recent commitment to become net carbon neutral by 2050. The new hub will adopt and employ advanced digital, intelligence and automation technologies to create a manufacturing space of world-class safety, productivity, reliability and sustainability performance."

"Dow is a global leader of material science solutions and we are happy to see its planned investment for establishing a specialties manufacturing hub in Zhanjiang,” said Liang Pei, party secretary of the Zhanjiang EDZ. “We are committed to turning our petrochemical park at the Donghai Island into a world-class one, providing a modern infrastructure and necessary supportive policies to Dow and the park’s other companies."

The Dow South China Specialties Hub will be located at Donghai Island in Zhanjiang, the farthest southern tip of mainland China. Unique advantages include a deep-water port, transportation networks, and a world-class chemical park with advanced infrastructure and services. The strategic location enables Dow to cover demand across Asia Pacific.

As MRC informed earlier, last year, Dow Chemical conducted a scheduled maintenance at its PDH unit in Freeport. Thus, the planned turnaround started in the week ended July 10 and lasted for 45 days.

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

According to MRC's ScanPlast report, 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.

The Dow Chemical Company is an American multinational chemical corporation. Dow is a large producer of plastics, including polystyrene, polyurethane, polyethylene, polypropylene, and synthetic rubber.
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Air Products starts up new ASU in Arizona

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Air Products has started operating a new air separation unit (ASU) in Chandler, Arizona, supplying gaseous nitrogen and high-purity oxygen under long-term contracts mainly to electronics industry and other customers, according to Chemweek.

The ASU is the sixth owned and operated by Air Products at the plant site in Chandler, it says.

The new unit is capable of producing over 2 million standard cubic feet/hour of nitrogen and over 20,000 standard cubic feet/hour of oxygen. Air Products says the location at Chandler, which it has operated since 1981, has potential for future capacity expansions. The company also operates two nitrogen pipelines connecting the facility to semiconductor manufacturers and other customers in the area.

The latest ASU project “also added a significant amount of additional low-pressure liquid nitrogen storage to maintain the reliability model at the site, as well as high purity oxygen storage,” it says.

As MRC reported earlier, in January 2021, Air Products signed a long-term gas supply contract with Shandong Binhua New Material Co., Ltd. (Binhua), a subsidiary of Befar Group, which is a leading petroleum and chemical enterprise in China, to support Binhua’s flagship chemical project located in the Beihai Economic Development Zone of Binzhou City, Shandong Province, China.

Under the contract, Air Products will build, own and operate several onsite gas production facilities in the Binzhou Port-centered Chemical Industry Park in phases, including an energy-efficient air separation unit (ASU), to meet Binhua’s gaseous oxygen and nitrogen demand. The ASU will also provide liquid products to other customers in the park and the growing merchant market in Shandong Province. All facilities will be fully operational in 2022.

We remind that China's Shandong Befar resumed production at its No. 1 an 3 propylene oxide lines in Binzhou City (Binzhou, Shandong Province, China) on June 28, 2020, following a scheduled maintenance. The turnaround at these lines with a total capacity of 200,000 mt/year of propylene oxide began on June 14, 2020.

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

According to MRC's ScanPlast report, PP shipments to the Russian market reached 141,870 tonnes in January 2021 versus 123,520 tonnes a year earlier. Supply of homopolymer PP and PP block copolymers increased.

Air Products has been operating in China since 1987 and was one of the first multinational industrial gases corporations to invest in the country. With nearly 90 operating entities, over 200 production facilities and more than 4,000 employees, the company has already established a strong market position across China and serves a broad range of industries. In Shandong Province, Air Products has built a strong presence and supply network since its first investment in 1995, comprising several operating entities, production facilities, hydrogen fueling stations and engineering design capability.
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COVID-19 - News digest as of 16.03.2021

1. Chevron to slow carbon emissions, raise oil and gas output through 2025

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Chevron outlined a plan to expand oil and gas production through 2025, but without spending significantly more, and pledged to limit the pace of growth of its carbon emissions, reported Reuters. Falling energy demand due to pandemic-driven lockdowns sent the industry into a tailspin in 2020 and led Chevron to a USD5.54 billion annual loss, its first since 2016. Investors have been pressuring Chevron and other oil companies to hold spending flat and reduce emissions that contribute to climate change. Competitors Royal Dutch Shell , BP Plc and Exxon Mobil have vowed to hold output flat or allow it to decline to meet climate or financial goals.



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