Bad weather stalls Bayer MaterialScience Brunsbuettel TDI restart

21 October 2009 12:49  [Source: ICIS news]

LONDON (ICIS news)--Bayer MaterialScience postponed the restart of its toluene di-isocyanate (TDI) facility at Brunsbuettel, Germany, due to bad weather hindering maintenance work, a company source said on Wednesday.

“We are on strict [sales] allocation. It will last for a minimum of this week and next week,” said the seller, adding that stocks were extremely low.

The 125,000 tonne/year TDI unit was originally expected to come back online over the weekend of 17-18 October following a three to four week turnaround. 

It was not known exactly when the unit would be back up but the source was hopeful that it could be this week.

The European TDI market remained tight, according to market players, following a series of maintenance and production issues in Europe and the US.

Perstorp’s force majeure (FM) on TDI from its Le Pont de Claix site in France remained ongoing. A company source said it was likely to be lifted by the end of the month, but this was not yet officially confirmed.

Perstorp declared FM at the end of September following technical difficulties at an upstream captive toluene diamine (TDA) unit at the Le Pont de Claix site.

Dow Chemical's TDI supplies in Europe were under allocation at least for the next few months, following the company’s FM declaration on its Voranate TDI Freeport facility in Texas earlier in the month due to technical difficulties.

European TDI producers were targeting hikes of €50-150/tonne ($75-$224/tonne) in November amid tight supply and buoyant demand in the bedding and furniture sectors.

The October TDI range was assessed between €2,070-2,150/tonne FD (free delivered) NWE (northwest Europe), according to global chemical market intelligence service ICIS pricing, although prices were also heard either side of the spread in a few cases

($ = €0.67)

For more on TDI visit ICIS chemical intelligence
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By: Heidi Finch
+44 20 8652 3214

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