Singapore plans aggressive chemicals expansion

26 February 2008 15:29  [Source: ICIS news]

SINGAPORE (ICIS News)--Singapore plans to expand further into value-added downstream activities in order to be more competitive in global chemical manufacturing, an official from the country’s Economic Development Board (EDB) said on Tuesday.

 

Lanxess’ planned 100,000 tonne/year butyl rubber facility on Singapore’s Jurong island was cited as an example of one of the projects that were in line with the nation’s strategic plan to move beyond commodities into specialties, said the EDB’s Aw Kah Peng.

  

“Singapore’s chemical industry is poised for the next phase of robust growth and sustainable development and we look forward to achieving this with key partners such as Lanxess,” added the EDB representative.

 

The country’s chemicals cluster, with output valued at Singapore dollars (S$) 82bn ($58.4bn) last year, had surpassed electronic manufacturing and was said to be now the largest contributor to the country’s manufacturing output at around 34% of the total, said the EDB.

 

Contribution from petroleum manufacturing last year was worth S$48bn, while petrochemicals contributed S$27bn and specialty chemicals S$6.7bn.

 

Innovation intensive projects had grown especially last year, said Julian Ho, executive director of the board’s energy, chemicals and engineering services cluster.

 

Ho cited as examples BASF SE’s new competence centre for organic electronics and Wacker Chemie’s new technical centre, both of which opened last year in Singapore.

 

Other chemical projects currently under construction in the island state include ExxonMobil's and Shell Chemicals’ new crackers slated to come on stream by 2011; India-based Tamil Nadu Petroproducts’ $110m (US dollar) normal paraffin plant; a styrene-based resins plant and a silica plant by Japanese company Denka; Mitsui Chemicals’ second facility in Singapore for its TAFMER line of resin modifier; and a high performance lubricant additives plant by Rohmax Additives GmbH. 

By: Doris de Guzman
+1 713 525 2653

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