BASF sees phased rollout of Nanjing expansion

18 March 2008 11:49  [Source: ICIS news]

SINGAPORE (ICIS news)--BASF will start up the $900m (€576m) expansion at its joint venture cracker complex in eastern China with Sinopec in phases until 2011, a company spokeswoman said on Tuesday.

The project cost, previously slated at $500m, was raised after a feasibility study showed that more funds were needed for infrastructure and logistics measures, she added.

Joint venture BASF-YPC will expand the capacity of its 600,000 tonne/year cracker in Nanjing, Jiangsu province, to 750,000 tonnes/year, increase capacities at existing downstream plants and also build new units.

The companies were waiting for approval from the central government which could be obtained within this year, BASF had said earlier.

It has started engineering work for the project which would come on stream in phases, beginning with the oxo-alcohol and propionic acid expansion in 2008, the spokeswoman said.

Its 250,000 tonne/year oxo-alcohols unit will be expanded to 300,000 tonnes/year to provide butanol feedstock for a proposed 80,000 tonne/year butylglycol ether unit.

The cracker expansion will go on stream in 2009-2010 while all the other plants would come on stream in stages until 2011, the spokeswoman said.

It will also expand its ethylene oxide (EO) plant by 80,000 tonnes/year and build a 60,000 tonne/year non-ionic surfactants unit.

BASF-YPC operates a 350,000 tonne/year ethylene glycol (EG) plant, but its EO capacity was not available.

BASF-YPC will also extend its acrylics chain by building a 60,000 tonnes/year super absorbent polymers (SAP) unit.

BASF and Sinopec invested $2.9bn in the first phase of the 50:50 joint venture.

BASF-YPC also operates a 300,000 tonne/year aromatics plant, a 400,000 tonne/year low density polyethylene/ethylene vinyl acetate (LDPE/EVA) plant and a 160,000 tonnes/year acrylic acid plant.

It also produces formic acid, propionic acid, methylamine and dimethylformamide (DMF) among other products0.

($1 = €0.64)

By: Florence Tan
+65 6780 4359

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