Mitsubishi India declares force majeure on PTA

29 July 2009 11:46  [Source: ICIS news]

SINGAPORE (ICIS news)--Mitsubishi Chemical (India) has declared force majeure on its supplies of purified terephthalic acid (PTA) after failing to restart its 480,000 tonne/year plant this week following an unplanned outage, a company source said on Wednesday.

“The force majeure was told to our customers [on 27 July]. It begins today for the month [of August],” the source said.

The company was supposed to have restarted the plant at Haldia, on the east coast of India, on 21 July after mechanical problems on 15 July forced it to be shut down.

Despite several attempts, the company failed to restart the plant, the source said.

Three of Mitsubishi’s customers confirmed that they received the force majeure notice on the evening of 27 July.

“They said they’d likely be able to supply only about 20% of the monthly volumes,” said a source from JBF Industries.

Mitsubishi India, owned by Japanese petrochemical major Mitsubishi Chemical, is also in the process of starting up a new 800,000 tonne/year PTA plant at the Haldia site.

The company had planned to start production at the new plant in June, but mechanical problems prevented it from doing so.

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By: Salmon Aidan Lee
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