Chemical Industry Weekly News Round-Up, June 8

This Week on CW:   At ACC’s 2012 annual meeting in Colorado Springs, CO, industry leaders expressed growing concern about declining energy and chemical prices and inventory destocking.   Five major multinationals, including Coca-Cola, have formed a...

Unipetrol Closes Unprofitable Urea Plant

Unipetrol (Prague), a member of the PKN Orlen Group (Plock, Poland), said today that it intends to close permanently its urea production facility at Litvínov, Czech Republic by the end of this year. The company cites economic reasons for the closure...

Rockwood-Kemira TiO2 JV Refinances Debt

Sachtleben (Duisburg, Germany), Rockwood and Kemira’s titanium dioxide (TiO2) joint venture, has entered into a new €430 million ($540 million) credit agreement consisting of two term loans and a revolving credit line, all of which mature in 2017. The term...

Tessenderlo to Build Specialty Fertilizers Plant in California

Tessenderlo Kerley Inc. (TKI; Phoenix, AZ), a Tessenderlo Group subsidiary, has announced plans to build a thiosulfate fertilizers plant at Hanford, CA. The company says it will also "optimize" its Fresno, CA facility to...

Westlake Divides Olefins and Business Development Units

Westlake Chemical says it has split its olefins and business development unit into two separate departments in order to provide focused attention and resources to the company’s ongoing corporate business development...

Dow Corning Opens Distribution Center in Belgium

Dow Corning says it has opened a 344,445-sq feet energy-efficient distribution center at Feluy, Belgium. The new distribution center more than doubles the capacity of Dow Corning's previous warehouse in Europe, and it cost more than €30 million, the...

Ethylene Falls to Near 10-Year Low

U.S. ethylene contracts for the month of May have settled at a decrease of 9 cts/lb, to 46.25 cts/lb, on lower spot prices and reduced production costs. The settlement reflects a 16% decrease from April levels and...

Coca-Cola Joins with Four Multinationals in Push for Biobased PET

Coca-Cola, Ford Motor Company, H.J. Heinz, Nike and Procter & Gamble have formed a consortium to promote research for developing polyethylene terephthalate (PET) that is 100% derived from renewable raw materials, a move that executives say will extend...

Bayer Completes Global Switch in Chlorine Production to Membrane Technology, Advances ODC Process

Bayer MaterialScience says it has completed a global switch in chlorine production to electricity-saving membrane technology. In addition, Bayer is also at the halfway point of a test phase for another pioneering process - known as the oxygen depolarized...