Industry: Polyolefins

Happy New Year to all our readers of Global Polyolefins & Elastomers – Strategic New Analysis from Chemical Market Resources, Inc. We greatly appreciate all the comments, suggestions, and ideas for improvement. Our goal is to assist you in “making sense” of the news items by relating them to past industry events, and strategic inferences […]

Borealis joint venture Borouge to expand polyethylene capacity to 580,000 MT/year Borouge, Borealis’ joint venture with ADNOC has announced its plans to expand its existing Borstar capacity and that is considering further expansion to form a world-scale petrochemical complex at Ruwais, Abu Dhabi in the UAE. Building on the successful start-up and first two years […]

DuPont Dow records first sales of new ENGAGE® grades DuPont Dow Elastomers reported the first commercial sales of ENGAGE polyolefin elastomer ethylene butene grades to the automotive TPO, plastics modification, and footwear markets. The company introduced 4 new grades of ENGAGE based on ethylene butene in August for these markets along with the compounding, extrusion, […]

BP licenses the Innovene® polypropylene technology line to Sinopec BP and China Petrochemical International Company, a Sinopec Corporation company, have reached an agreement to license BP’s Innovene gas phase polypropylene process technology for the upgrading of Sinopec’s Beijing Yanhua Petrochemical Company Limited Polypropylene manufacturing complex. The plant will produce homopolymers and random copolymers and will […]

Nova Chemicals outlines business improvement initiatives after the third quarter loss of $65 million Nova Chemical Corporation reported a third-quarter loss of $65 million. Approximately $9 million was attributed to the power interruption – as announced earlier. Approximately $10 million was attributed to from expenses associated with the permanent closure of the polyethylene line in […]

Basell to license new Spherizone technology for polypropylene manufacturing Basell announced that the Spherizone process, a new manufacturing technology that significantly and uniquely expands the polypropylene property envelope, is now available for license on a global basis. The Spherizone process is based on MultiZone Circulating Reactor (MZCR) technology that enables the production of more uniform […]

Basell unveils novel Ziegler-Natta PP catalysts Basell introduced a new Ziegler-Natta catalyst family based on ethyl-benzoate as an internal donor that improves polymer morphology and bulk density. The proprietary ethyl-benzoate catalysts are designed specifically for gas-phase polypropylene processes and are also suitable for liquid-phase polymerization. Basell has developed this catalyst on an advanced magnesium chloride […]

Dow Chemical Company to acquire Celanese acrylics business The Dow Chemical Company and Celanese AG announced that they have reached an agreement for Dow to purchase the acrylics business of Celanese. Dow will acquire Celanese’s acrylics business product line, including intellectual property, inventory, and technology for crude acrylic acid, glacial acrylic acid, methyl, ethyl and […]

Sumitomo Chemical and Mitsui Chemicals dissolve joint polyolefins business Sumitomo Chemical Co., Ltd. and Mitsui Chemicals Inc have agreed to dissolve the business arrangementfor their polyolefins joint venture company, Sumitomo Mitsui Polyolefin Co., Ltd. (SMPO), effective October 1, 2003. Accordingly, SMPO will transfer its marketing and research functions back to both companies, and employees will […]

Dow to idle 900 million pounds of polyethylene capacity Dow Chemical announced that it had begun the process of idling about 900 million pounds of North American PE capacity due to low polyethylene demand, higher feedstock costs and eroding polyethylene margins. Dow began the idling process Aug. 14, and the company said that most of […]

ExxonMobil Corporation and Symyx Technologies, Inc. form an alliance on high throughput experimentation – Symyx Stock (SMMX) jumps +15% ExxonMobil Corporation and Symyx Technologies, Inc have formed a technology alliance focused on high throughput experimentation (HTE). The companies will work together over a five-year period to develop the system for chemicals, lubricants and fuels products […]

BP and Philips starts up HDPE Plant BP Solvay and Chevron Phillips Chemical have started up their joint 700-million lbs/year high density polyethylene (HDPE) plant at Cedar Bayou, TX. The new plant replaces three lines at Deer Park, TX which had a combined HDPE capacity of 260 million pounds per year. BP Solvay Polyethylene North […]