Total/INEOS Lavera polypropylene plant restart due end of August

04 August 2010 12:36  [Source: ICIS news]

LONDON (ICIS)--Total Petrochemicals and INEOS’s 300,000 tonne/year joint-venture polypropylene (PP) plant at Lavera, France, is due back up at the end of August, said an INEOS company source on Wednesday.

The source also confirmed that force majeure was in place, as reported by PP customers of the plant at the end of July, following several days of troubled production.

The European PP market remained balanced to tight in August, and while demand was lower because of holidays, even Italian volumes were better than normal, said some sellers.

“Demand is not wonderful, but it’s not bad for August. I’m still getting orders for the odd truck here and there,” said an Italian distributor.

Prices were down by up to €25/tonne ($33/tonne) so far for the month, following the propylene monomer contract settlement at €940/tonne FD (free delivered) NWE (northwest Europe), down by €38/tonne from the July contract level.

Homopolymer injection from European selling sources was reported to be trading around €1,250/tonne FD NWE on a net basis.

European PP buyers had been consistently frustrated by attempts to buy significant volumes of imported material which they had expected to arrive from new Middle Eastern plants by mid-2010. Buyers had been forced to accept increases throughout the year, and still did not envisage large quantities of imported material before the end of 2010.

New plants had been delayed, and producers preferred to send material eastwards rather than to Europe wherever possible. The recent upturn in Asian pricing was expected to delay imports into Europe for longer than had been expected.

PP producers in Europe include LyondellBasell, Borealis, SABIC, Total Petrochemicals, Dow Chemical, Repsol, INEOS Olefins and Polymers, Polychim and Domo.

($1 = €0.76)

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By: Linda Naylor
+44 20 8652 3214

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