- Email: [email protected]
Canada: Titan International – carbon black from scrap rubber
F O C US
PLANTS Argentina: Julio Garcia & Hijos – plastics masterbatch Concentrados & Compuestos SA, a wholly-owned subsidiary within the Julio Garcia & Hijos group, is on the point of completing the expansion of its masterbatch plant at Pilar (60 km northwest of Buenos Aires citycentre). The expansion consists of installing three new extrusion lines, which will raise capacity at Pilar from 1200 tonnes/y to 4800 tonnes/y. Original Source: Plastics News, 7 Jul 2014, (Website: http://www.plasticsnews.com) © Crain Communications Inc 2014
Australia: Clariant – masterbatch Clariant is currently building a plastics masterbatch plant at a site in the Greater Sydney area and the plant should be commissioned before the end of this year. No details have been given as to the size of the plant, nor as to the budgeted capital expenditure. Clariant already operates more than 50 masterbatch plants worldwide, including 16 in the Asia/Pacific region – Guangzhou, Beijing-Huairou and Shanghai-XingZhuang (China); Rania, Kalol, Nandesari and ThaneKolshet (India); Tangerang (Indonesia); Simpang Ampat and Shah Alam (Malaysia); Albany (New Zealand); Jurong (Singapore); Taoyuan (Taiwan); Chonburi (Thailand); and ThuanAn (Vietnam). Mr Mathias Lütgendorf (a member of Clariant’s Executive Board) said: “Working closely with our Albany site (located about 20 km north of Auckland city-centre), the Australian plant will produce a full range of colour and additive masterbatches tailored to local customer requirements, along with colour-matching and quality-control capabilities. The Asia/Pacific region is one of our focal areas for future development. The new Australian plant will support the growth of our Masterbatches business, increasing its customer service focus in the region.” In Indonesia, the company recently doubled the capacity of its Tangerang masterbatch plant. (See also ‘Focus on Pigments’, Aug 2014, 6). In India, the company increased its
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total masterbatch capacity from 15,000 tonnes/y to 39,000 tonnes/y thanks to its $21.5 M acquisition of Plastichemix. (See also ‘Focus on Pigments’, Mar 2014, 6). Last September, Clariant disclosed that it was planning to transfer masterbatch production from Thane-Kolshet to a different site, probably Roha. (See ‘Focus on Pigments’, Sep 2013, 6). The parent company – Clariant Chemicals (India) Ltd – recently opened its new headquarters complex at the Reliable Tech Park in Airoli (30 km northeast of Mumbai citycentre). About 400 people will be employed here. During recent years, Clariant has accomplished a major rationalisation of its corporate activities, divesting its businesses in paper chemicals, textile chemicals, leather chemicals, emulsions, detergents and intermediates. The remaining core business units were regrouped into four new segments or “business areas” for financial reporting purposes. The Masterbatch, Pigments and Additives business units were grouped as Plastics & Coatings. The other three segments are: Care Chemicals, Catalysts & Energy and Natural Resources. For full-year 2013, Plastics & Coatings reported earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) at SFR 356 M on sales revenues of SFR 2.521 bn, representing a profitability margin of 14.1%. For 1H 2014, EBITDA was SFR 191 M on sales revenues of SFR 1.312 bn, indicating a profitability margin of 14.6% – virtually the same as for 1H 2013. The company aims to raise the profitability margin for Plastics & Coatings to 17% or more in full-year 2015. Original Source: Clariant AG, Rothaustrasse 61, CH-4132 Muttenz 1, Switzerland, website: http://www.clariant.com (30 Jul & 12 Aug 2014) © Clariant 2014. Original Source: Chemical Weekly, 24 Jun 2014, 144 (Website: http://www.chemicalweekly.com) © Sevak Publications & Chemical Weekly Database P Ltd 2014
Brazil: PolyOne – masterbatch PolyOne Corp has announced a major restructuring programme for its Brazilian activities. The company will shut down two plants in its Speciality Engineering Materials business, producing a wide range of polyolefins,
nylon and other “technical polymers.” The two plants are located at Joinville (130 km south of Curitiba, Santa Catarina province) and Diadema (20 km south of Sao Paulo). Associated with these moves, PolyOne will incur cash costs of approximately $5 M and non-cash charges of $12 M, mainly related to accelerated depreciation and asset impairments. The company will continue to operate and invest in its two other Brazilian manufacturing sites – at Novo Hamburgo (40 km north of Porto Alegre, Rio Grande do Sul province) and Itupeva (75 km northwest of Sao Paulo). PolyOne produces various colorants, additives and masterbatches at these two sites. Original Source: PolyOne Corp, 33587 Walker Road, Avon Lake, OH 44012, USA, website: http://www.polyone.com (15 Jul 2014) © PolyOne 2014
Canada: Titan International – carbon black from scrap rubber Titan International (headquartered at Quincy, IL) plans to build a scrap rubber pyrolysis facility on a 4 hectare site, just north of Fort McMurray (440 km north of Edmonton) in northeastern Alberta. The facility will employ a process developed by Green Carbon Inc (of Rome, GA), processing about 44,000 tonnes/y of rubber to generate more than 12,000 tonnes/y of carbon black and more than 6000 tonnes/y of 1075 grade steel, plus 2.3 M litres/y of oil. Input for this facility will consist mainly of scrap off-road vehicle tyres and conveyor belts supplied by the tar sands processing companies in the region. In fact, the site on which the facility will be built is owned by Suncor Energy (one of the major companies in the tar sands industry) and it has been made available to Titan International on a 10-year renewable lease. Titan International states that its facility will be able to handle a variety of large off-road tyres, including the world’s largest tyre – the Michelin 59/80 R-63 XDR, which has a width of 1.5 metres, a diameter of 4.03 metres, weighs more than 5 tonnes and contains 3.85 tonnes of rubber. Processing a tyre of this size, employing the Green Carbon process, would generate: 4000 pounds (1.8 tonnes) of carbon black. Operating this facility will entitle Titan OCTOBER 2014
F O C US International to claim carbon footprint credits. The carbon black recovered will be purchased by Titan International for use in making new tyres. The oil recovered will probably be converted into kerosene. With the Green Carbon process, sufficient fuel gas is generated to meet 88% of the process energy requirements. Titan International is one of North America’s major suppliers of off-road tyres, with a history stretching back more than 100 years. The company has grown significantly in recent years as a result of purchasing non-core assets from Goodyear, Continental Rubber and Voltyre. Mr Maurice Taylor (Chairman & CEO of Titan International) is the brother of Mr Fred Taylor (President of Green Carbon Inc). Mr Maurice Taylor commented: “We have been working together for three years to prove this process. It is gratifying to move forward as we feel this system is extremely eco-friendly.” The Fort McMurray plant should be ready for operation by mid-2015. Once it is up and running successfully, Titan International plans to build a second plant at a location somewhere west of Edmonton. Titan International Inc, 2701 Spruce Street, Quincy, IL 6230, USA, tel: +1-(217) 228 6011, website: http://www.titan-intl.com (3 Jun 2014) © Titan International 2014
Egypt: Phillips – carbon black Phillips Carbon Black (part of the RP Sanjiv Goenka conglomerate, headquartered in Kolkata/Calcutta) plans to invest $170 M in the construction of a new 140,000 tonnes/y carbon black plant at Bourjal-Arab (65 km southwest of Alexandria). The plant is due to come on-stream in 2016. This will be Egypt’s second carbon black plant. The first plant – located at El Ameriya (30 km southwest of Alexandria) – came onstream during the mid-1990s and it now has a capacity of 285,000 tonnes/y. This plant is owned by the Aditya Birla group (headquartered in Mumbai). Original Source: Plastics and Rubber Asia, Aug 2014, 29 (207 (Rubber Journal Asia)), 1 (Website: http://www.plasticsandrubberasia.com) © Plastics & Rubber Asia Ltd 2014
OCTOBER 2014
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Germany & Brazil: Feddersen/AkroPlastic – plastic compounds
India: Jay Chemical & Saraswati Pigments – phthalocyanine blue
Two years ago, Akro-Plastic (part of the KD Feddersen group, headquartered in Hamburg) opened a new plastic compounds plant at Niederzissen (45 km south of Bonn). Initial capacity was 60,000 tonnes/y and work is currently underway to raise this to 80,000 tonnes/y by the end of 2014 and to 110,000 tonnes/y by the end of 2019. Akro-Plastic opened its first plastic compounds plant in China – at Suzhou – in 2004. Six years later, the company opened a second Chinese plant, at Wujiang (100 km west of Shanghai). The company is currently building a new plastic compounds plant at Sao Paulo (Brazil) and this plant is expected to come on-stream in 1Q 2015.
Jay Chemical Industries (of Ahmedabad, Gujarat) has paid $203,000 for a licence to use technology patented by Saraswati Pigments (of Vadodara, Gujarat) to improve the economics of its phthalo blue manufacturing operations. Saraswati’s technology was described in the Indian patent 2755/MUM/2012, dated 24 September 2012 and the company recently applied for patent protection with the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO), reference 2014/045249-A1. Both Jay Chemical and Saraswati are significant manufacturers of phthalo blue, employing the conventional Wyler process, which entails heating phthalic anhydride (or a derivative) with a copper compound and urea within an inert solvent at 150-250°C. The solvent (typically dior tri-chlorobenzene, nitro- or nitroalkyl-benzene or sulfolane) is removed by filtration or vacuum distillation and the crude copper phthalocyanine is then extracted by boiling with a dilute mineral acid. The reaction time is normally 12-16 hours. To maximise yields, a stoichiometric excess of urea is used, often 2-4 moles of urea per mole of phthalic anhydride. In a commercial-scale plant, there is some decomposition of the urea and urea compounds, generating waste gases that are absorbed in water for disposal or for further treatment to produce ammonia solution or an ammonium salt (sulfate, phosphate or carbonate). Saraswati’s patented process involves saturating the “waste ammonia solution” to achieve a 10-35% concentration, then treating the saturated solution with phthalic anhydride in the presence of suitable catalysts (phthalimide, 1,3-diiminoisoindoline or dihydroindazolone and dilute nitric acid) in suitable solvents (chlorinated toluenes, linear alkyl benzene, nitrotoluene). The phthalocyanine intermediates are then converted into metal phthalocyanines by reacting them with a measured (just sufficient) quantity of urea plus a metal salt. Employing this add-on process provides higher overall product yields, provides raw material savings and reduces the load of ammoniacal
Original Source: Compounding World, Jul 2014, 70 (Website: http://www.amiplastics.com/mags) © Applied Market Information Ltd 2014
India: Deepak Nitrite – optical brighteners Deepak Nitrite declared the official start-up of full-scale production at its new optical brighteners plant on 20 May 2014. The plant was built on a greenfields site at Dahej (Gujarat province, 110 km southwest of Vadodara). It has a nameplate capacity of 91,000 tonnes/y. Deepak Nitrite claims to be the only fully vertically integrated manufacturer of optical brighteners in the world, producing all the key products in the value-chain: toluene; paranitrotoluene (PNT); and 4,4diaminostilbene 2,2 disulfonic acid (DASDA); as well as a wide portfolio of optical brighteners suitable for the paper, detergent and textile end-use sectors. In fact, the Dahej plant is probably the largest optical brighteners plant in the world. During the quarter to end-June 2014, Deepak Nitrite reported sales revenues from its optical brighteners business as Rup 590 M (equivalent to $9.7 M), compared against Rup 300 M (equivalent to $4.9 M) for the quarter to end-June 2013. Original Source: Deepak Nitrite Ltd, Aaditya-I, National Highway No 8, Chhani Road, 390024 Vadodara, India, tel: +91 (265) 276 5200, website: http://www.deepaknitrite.com (7 Aug 2014) © Deepak Nitrite Ltd 2014
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PLANTS Argentina: Julio Garcia & Hijos – plastics masterbatch Concentrados & Compuestos SA, a wholly-owned subsidiary within the Julio Garcia & Hijos group, is on the point of completing the expansion of its masterbatch plant at Pilar (60 km northwest of Buenos Aires citycentre). The expansion consists of installing three new extrusion lines, which will raise capacity at Pilar from 1200 tonnes/y to 4800 tonnes/y. Original Source: Plastics News, 7 Jul 2014, (Website: http://www.plasticsnews.com) © Crain Communications Inc 2014
Australia: Clariant – masterbatch Clariant is currently building a plastics masterbatch plant at a site in the Greater Sydney area and the plant should be commissioned before the end of this year. No details have been given as to the size of the plant, nor as to the budgeted capital expenditure. Clariant already operates more than 50 masterbatch plants worldwide, including 16 in the Asia/Pacific region – Guangzhou, Beijing-Huairou and Shanghai-XingZhuang (China); Rania, Kalol, Nandesari and ThaneKolshet (India); Tangerang (Indonesia); Simpang Ampat and Shah Alam (Malaysia); Albany (New Zealand); Jurong (Singapore); Taoyuan (Taiwan); Chonburi (Thailand); and ThuanAn (Vietnam). Mr Mathias Lütgendorf (a member of Clariant’s Executive Board) said: “Working closely with our Albany site (located about 20 km north of Auckland city-centre), the Australian plant will produce a full range of colour and additive masterbatches tailored to local customer requirements, along with colour-matching and quality-control capabilities. The Asia/Pacific region is one of our focal areas for future development. The new Australian plant will support the growth of our Masterbatches business, increasing its customer service focus in the region.” In Indonesia, the company recently doubled the capacity of its Tangerang masterbatch plant. (See also ‘Focus on Pigments’, Aug 2014, 6). In India, the company increased its
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total masterbatch capacity from 15,000 tonnes/y to 39,000 tonnes/y thanks to its $21.5 M acquisition of Plastichemix. (See also ‘Focus on Pigments’, Mar 2014, 6). Last September, Clariant disclosed that it was planning to transfer masterbatch production from Thane-Kolshet to a different site, probably Roha. (See ‘Focus on Pigments’, Sep 2013, 6). The parent company – Clariant Chemicals (India) Ltd – recently opened its new headquarters complex at the Reliable Tech Park in Airoli (30 km northeast of Mumbai citycentre). About 400 people will be employed here. During recent years, Clariant has accomplished a major rationalisation of its corporate activities, divesting its businesses in paper chemicals, textile chemicals, leather chemicals, emulsions, detergents and intermediates. The remaining core business units were regrouped into four new segments or “business areas” for financial reporting purposes. The Masterbatch, Pigments and Additives business units were grouped as Plastics & Coatings. The other three segments are: Care Chemicals, Catalysts & Energy and Natural Resources. For full-year 2013, Plastics & Coatings reported earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) at SFR 356 M on sales revenues of SFR 2.521 bn, representing a profitability margin of 14.1%. For 1H 2014, EBITDA was SFR 191 M on sales revenues of SFR 1.312 bn, indicating a profitability margin of 14.6% – virtually the same as for 1H 2013. The company aims to raise the profitability margin for Plastics & Coatings to 17% or more in full-year 2015. Original Source: Clariant AG, Rothaustrasse 61, CH-4132 Muttenz 1, Switzerland, website: http://www.clariant.com (30 Jul & 12 Aug 2014) © Clariant 2014. Original Source: Chemical Weekly, 24 Jun 2014, 144 (Website: http://www.chemicalweekly.com) © Sevak Publications & Chemical Weekly Database P Ltd 2014
Brazil: PolyOne – masterbatch PolyOne Corp has announced a major restructuring programme for its Brazilian activities. The company will shut down two plants in its Speciality Engineering Materials business, producing a wide range of polyolefins,
nylon and other “technical polymers.” The two plants are located at Joinville (130 km south of Curitiba, Santa Catarina province) and Diadema (20 km south of Sao Paulo). Associated with these moves, PolyOne will incur cash costs of approximately $5 M and non-cash charges of $12 M, mainly related to accelerated depreciation and asset impairments. The company will continue to operate and invest in its two other Brazilian manufacturing sites – at Novo Hamburgo (40 km north of Porto Alegre, Rio Grande do Sul province) and Itupeva (75 km northwest of Sao Paulo). PolyOne produces various colorants, additives and masterbatches at these two sites. Original Source: PolyOne Corp, 33587 Walker Road, Avon Lake, OH 44012, USA, website: http://www.polyone.com (15 Jul 2014) © PolyOne 2014
Canada: Titan International – carbon black from scrap rubber Titan International (headquartered at Quincy, IL) plans to build a scrap rubber pyrolysis facility on a 4 hectare site, just north of Fort McMurray (440 km north of Edmonton) in northeastern Alberta. The facility will employ a process developed by Green Carbon Inc (of Rome, GA), processing about 44,000 tonnes/y of rubber to generate more than 12,000 tonnes/y of carbon black and more than 6000 tonnes/y of 1075 grade steel, plus 2.3 M litres/y of oil. Input for this facility will consist mainly of scrap off-road vehicle tyres and conveyor belts supplied by the tar sands processing companies in the region. In fact, the site on which the facility will be built is owned by Suncor Energy (one of the major companies in the tar sands industry) and it has been made available to Titan International on a 10-year renewable lease. Titan International states that its facility will be able to handle a variety of large off-road tyres, including the world’s largest tyre – the Michelin 59/80 R-63 XDR, which has a width of 1.5 metres, a diameter of 4.03 metres, weighs more than 5 tonnes and contains 3.85 tonnes of rubber. Processing a tyre of this size, employing the Green Carbon process, would generate: 4000 pounds (1.8 tonnes) of carbon black. Operating this facility will entitle Titan OCTOBER 2014
F O C US International to claim carbon footprint credits. The carbon black recovered will be purchased by Titan International for use in making new tyres. The oil recovered will probably be converted into kerosene. With the Green Carbon process, sufficient fuel gas is generated to meet 88% of the process energy requirements. Titan International is one of North America’s major suppliers of off-road tyres, with a history stretching back more than 100 years. The company has grown significantly in recent years as a result of purchasing non-core assets from Goodyear, Continental Rubber and Voltyre. Mr Maurice Taylor (Chairman & CEO of Titan International) is the brother of Mr Fred Taylor (President of Green Carbon Inc). Mr Maurice Taylor commented: “We have been working together for three years to prove this process. It is gratifying to move forward as we feel this system is extremely eco-friendly.” The Fort McMurray plant should be ready for operation by mid-2015. Once it is up and running successfully, Titan International plans to build a second plant at a location somewhere west of Edmonton. Titan International Inc, 2701 Spruce Street, Quincy, IL 6230, USA, tel: +1-(217) 228 6011, website: http://www.titan-intl.com (3 Jun 2014) © Titan International 2014
Egypt: Phillips – carbon black Phillips Carbon Black (part of the RP Sanjiv Goenka conglomerate, headquartered in Kolkata/Calcutta) plans to invest $170 M in the construction of a new 140,000 tonnes/y carbon black plant at Bourjal-Arab (65 km southwest of Alexandria). The plant is due to come on-stream in 2016. This will be Egypt’s second carbon black plant. The first plant – located at El Ameriya (30 km southwest of Alexandria) – came onstream during the mid-1990s and it now has a capacity of 285,000 tonnes/y. This plant is owned by the Aditya Birla group (headquartered in Mumbai). Original Source: Plastics and Rubber Asia, Aug 2014, 29 (207 (Rubber Journal Asia)), 1 (Website: http://www.plasticsandrubberasia.com) © Plastics & Rubber Asia Ltd 2014
OCTOBER 2014
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PIGMENTS
Germany & Brazil: Feddersen/AkroPlastic – plastic compounds
India: Jay Chemical & Saraswati Pigments – phthalocyanine blue
Two years ago, Akro-Plastic (part of the KD Feddersen group, headquartered in Hamburg) opened a new plastic compounds plant at Niederzissen (45 km south of Bonn). Initial capacity was 60,000 tonnes/y and work is currently underway to raise this to 80,000 tonnes/y by the end of 2014 and to 110,000 tonnes/y by the end of 2019. Akro-Plastic opened its first plastic compounds plant in China – at Suzhou – in 2004. Six years later, the company opened a second Chinese plant, at Wujiang (100 km west of Shanghai). The company is currently building a new plastic compounds plant at Sao Paulo (Brazil) and this plant is expected to come on-stream in 1Q 2015.
Jay Chemical Industries (of Ahmedabad, Gujarat) has paid $203,000 for a licence to use technology patented by Saraswati Pigments (of Vadodara, Gujarat) to improve the economics of its phthalo blue manufacturing operations. Saraswati’s technology was described in the Indian patent 2755/MUM/2012, dated 24 September 2012 and the company recently applied for patent protection with the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO), reference 2014/045249-A1. Both Jay Chemical and Saraswati are significant manufacturers of phthalo blue, employing the conventional Wyler process, which entails heating phthalic anhydride (or a derivative) with a copper compound and urea within an inert solvent at 150-250°C. The solvent (typically dior tri-chlorobenzene, nitro- or nitroalkyl-benzene or sulfolane) is removed by filtration or vacuum distillation and the crude copper phthalocyanine is then extracted by boiling with a dilute mineral acid. The reaction time is normally 12-16 hours. To maximise yields, a stoichiometric excess of urea is used, often 2-4 moles of urea per mole of phthalic anhydride. In a commercial-scale plant, there is some decomposition of the urea and urea compounds, generating waste gases that are absorbed in water for disposal or for further treatment to produce ammonia solution or an ammonium salt (sulfate, phosphate or carbonate). Saraswati’s patented process involves saturating the “waste ammonia solution” to achieve a 10-35% concentration, then treating the saturated solution with phthalic anhydride in the presence of suitable catalysts (phthalimide, 1,3-diiminoisoindoline or dihydroindazolone and dilute nitric acid) in suitable solvents (chlorinated toluenes, linear alkyl benzene, nitrotoluene). The phthalocyanine intermediates are then converted into metal phthalocyanines by reacting them with a measured (just sufficient) quantity of urea plus a metal salt. Employing this add-on process provides higher overall product yields, provides raw material savings and reduces the load of ammoniacal
Original Source: Compounding World, Jul 2014, 70 (Website: http://www.amiplastics.com/mags) © Applied Market Information Ltd 2014
India: Deepak Nitrite – optical brighteners Deepak Nitrite declared the official start-up of full-scale production at its new optical brighteners plant on 20 May 2014. The plant was built on a greenfields site at Dahej (Gujarat province, 110 km southwest of Vadodara). It has a nameplate capacity of 91,000 tonnes/y. Deepak Nitrite claims to be the only fully vertically integrated manufacturer of optical brighteners in the world, producing all the key products in the value-chain: toluene; paranitrotoluene (PNT); and 4,4diaminostilbene 2,2 disulfonic acid (DASDA); as well as a wide portfolio of optical brighteners suitable for the paper, detergent and textile end-use sectors. In fact, the Dahej plant is probably the largest optical brighteners plant in the world. During the quarter to end-June 2014, Deepak Nitrite reported sales revenues from its optical brighteners business as Rup 590 M (equivalent to $9.7 M), compared against Rup 300 M (equivalent to $4.9 M) for the quarter to end-June 2013. Original Source: Deepak Nitrite Ltd, Aaditya-I, National Highway No 8, Chhani Road, 390024 Vadodara, India, tel: +91 (265) 276 5200, website: http://www.deepaknitrite.com (7 Aug 2014) © Deepak Nitrite Ltd 2014
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