Polyolefins markets in Asia are not behaving in the way that they used to behave. For value-added analysis of these changes, and for price and margin forecasts for the region, contact john.richardson@icis.com for details of how to subscribe to our Asian Polypropylene and Asian Polyethylene forecast reports. By John Richardson NOT everything in […]
Asian Chemical Connections
China Coal-To-Olefins Projects Not Just About Oil Prices
By John Richardson CHINA will do what suits China from a national perspective. Remember this in all your new thinking about how its chemicals industry will behave in the future and I think you will be on the right tracks. So, as in the past, you cannot afford to look at the cost-per-tonne economics of […]
China Coal-To-Olefins: Water Not An Issue
By John Richardson CONVENTIONAL wisdom has it that the water issue stands in the way of the growth of the coal-to-olefins (CTO) industry in China. The process consumes a lot of water – between 15-20 tonnes for every tonne of olefins produced – which compares with 0.80-2.17 tonnes of water for every tonne of oil […]
China’s Methanol Industry: Through The Looking Glass
By John Richardson AT first glance, some of the facts relating to China’s methanol sector sound like Jabberwocky sounded to Alice when she firs discovered the language of that name in the marvellous Lewis Carroll novel, Alice Through The Looking Glass. Here are some examples of what we are talking about, from our colleagues at […]
The “Why” Behind Sinopec’s Investment Freeze
By John Richardson SINOPEC has announced that it will halt some of its new petrochemicals investments. This could involve the postponement of up to three cracker projects with a combined ethylene capacity of 2.8m tonnes/year, according to this excellent story from my ICIS colleague, Fanny Zhang. The company confirmed that the 1m tonnes/year Qingdao Petrochemical […]
China Jobs Versus The Cost Curve
By John Richardson ACHIEVING approval for any new petrochemicals projects in China is going to be a lot harder in the future, is a a growing view across the chemicals industry. A senior executive with a US-based polyolefins producer, for example, told the blog recently: “It looks as if Chinese chemicals companies are finding it […]
China: The Cost of Shutting Down
By John Richardson ONCE a petrochemicals plant is built it is pretty hard to shut it down. This might well apply to Europe, which is why we think talk of widespread cracker and derivatives closures to make way for highly competitive new US and Middle East capacity could be overdone. And definitely, without any shadow […]
China Will Do What Suits China
By John Richardson CHINA might well be in the midst of deflation caused by overcapacity in some chemicals, and in many other industries as well, but the longer-term strategic direction of reducing dependence on imports doesn’t appear to have changed. An indication of this was this story from my colleague Lilian Hua at ICIS. She […]
Reassessing China Petchem Projects
By John Richardson Methanol-to-olefins (MTO) projects in China are subject to more disagreement over viability than any other group of petrochemicals investments, said HSBC in a report released last month. HSBC, for example, takes a pretty negative view of the economics of MTO projects. This applies both to planned investments based on locally-sourced coal – […]
China Coal-To-Olefins Storm In A Teacup?
: Source: NRELC, China Coal Research Institute, HSBC estimates By John Richardson THERE has been a lot of interest in China’s coals-to-olefins (CTO) industry, with arguments that it is a very economically viable method of production. On paper, there is even more capacity due on-stream than in the US as it forges ahead with […]
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