Asian Chemical Connections

MEG Continues To Struggle

By John Richardson THE above chart is a further illustration of what we believe is the wrong consensus view over China. Q1 2012 mono-ethylene glycol (MEG) imports surged by 30% compared with the same period last year, as traders bet...

Posted by John on May 4, 2012 2:29 AM

China's March Inflation

By John Richardson THE importance of reliable market intelligence on China was further emphasised on Monday with the release of the March inflation data. Last week a sales and marketing executive with a polyolefins producer told us: ""Although the overall inflation...

Posted by John on April 11, 2012 2:13 AM

MEG's Fading Star

  By John Richardson CHINA'S mono-ethylene (MEG) market was supposed to be very strong this year. But instead, to date we have seen persistently weak market conditions that few people, least of all the traders, seem to have anticipated. The...

Posted by John on April 10, 2012 2:59 AM

China Synthetic Fibres Fall Further

By John Richardson CHINA'S synthetic fibres chain continues to show serious signs of distress as a result of weak domestic and export demand, according to my ICIS colleagues, Judith Wang and Becky Zhang. Traders in monoethylene glycol (MEG) must have believed...

Posted by John on March 20, 2012 2:41 PM

MEG bucks the trend

By Malini Hariharan There are some exceptions to the generally weak petrochemical markets seen in Asia these days and monoethylene glycol (MEG) is one such product. Spot prices have hit a 44-month high of $1,275-1,280/tonne CFR China and are expected...

Posted by John on September 8, 2011 12:27 AM

NEW EO-Derivative Investments Planned For Singapore

      Source of picture: chemindustry.org.sg     By John Richardson NEW plants could be built in Singapore downstream of Shell Chemicals plans for optimising high-purity ethylene oxide (EO) production in the city state, the blog was told recently...

Posted by John on January 10, 2011 10:38 PM

Reliance Reveals Major Investment Plans

    By Malini Hariharan India's Reliance Industries is evaluating investments in a number of chemicals including olefins and derivatives, acetyls, elastomers and fibre intermediates to increase its petrochemicals production from crude, a senior company executive has told the...

Posted by John on November 16, 2010 2:29 PM

Saudi Gas Shortage Will Last A Long Time

  Goodbye to all of that Source of picture: www.gas2.org     By John Richardson in Mumbai for the Asia Petrochemical Industry Conference (APIC) EXISTING Saudi Arabian crackers will continue to run at less than 100% until the Kingdom's oil...

Posted by John on May 13, 2010 2:10 AM

China: Yet More Record Imports

By John Richardson The extraordinary China import story continues, raising yet more questions about where all these volumes are going at a time when the government is trying to cool the economy down. Does this mean that speculation continues apace...

Posted by John on May 4, 2010 2:19 AM

Shell would like to build two MEG plants in Qatar

  By John Richardson An ethane shortage is slowing Shell Chemicals' ambitions for building at least one cracker complex in Qatar, Ben van Beurden, executive vice-president of the company said last week. "Ideally, we'd like to build two crackers...

Posted by John on December 14, 2009 2:49 AM

Has Shell Made The Right Choices on MEG?

Looking pretty - the new Shell plant at night: Sourceof picture: Shell Chemicals   By John Richardson WHEN Shell Chemicals officially opened its OMEGA process 750,000 tonne/year monoethylene glycol (MEG) plant in Singapore today, it mentioned how its global production...

Posted by John on December 11, 2009 8:48 AM