By John Richardson THE PROSPECT of a US-China trade war has edged closer as a result of President Trump’s announcement yesterday that the US will impose 25% import tariffs on steel and 10% import tariffs on aluminium. Countries hit hard by the tariffs will include China and Canada. We luckily avoided a trade war in […]
Asian Chemical Connections
Peak Oil And The Aramco/SABIC Petchems Project
By John Richardson THERE is an important connection between this week’s announcement by Saudi Aramco and SABIC of an MoU for a direct oil-to-chemicals complex and the Tesla Semi electric truck, which is being trialled by DHL and other logistics companies. To fully understand this link, let’s first consider the wider context behind the Tesla truck […]
Global Polypropylene In 2018-2025: What To Plan For
By John Richardson THIS could be an excellent investment opportunity. Our ICIS Supply and Demand Database base case for Asian and global polypropylene (PP) operating rates sees the steady and steep climb that began in 2014 carrying on until a peak in 2020. In that year, global operating rates will reach 94% and Asian capacity […]
India Creates 20,000 New Jobs A Month When It Needs One Million
By John Richardson WHEN Narendra Modi was campaigning to be India’s Prime Minister in 2013 he promised to create 10m new jobs every year. But in July 2014-December 2016, after Modi had become PM, 614,000 jobs were created in India’s eight major employment sectors – manufacturing, trade, construction, education, health, information technology, transport, accommodation and […]
How China Will Help South Asia Maximise Its Demographic Dividend….
….as the OBOR region, which includes South Asia, pushes towards complete petrochemicals self-sufficiency By John Richardson SOUTH ASIA (India, Bangladesh, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka) is seeing around 1m people join its workforce every month, with this potential demographic dividend set to last for the next two decades, according to the World Bank. That is […]
Four Billion Tonnes of Plastic Waste And Counting: The Threat To Petchems Growth
By John Richardson THE world will have produced a total of 6.9bn tonnes of the 11 synthetic polymers I’ve detailed in the above chart between 1978, when our data begins, and the end of 2017. Using the assumptions behind an important new study that was launched in July this year, let’s assume that 76% of […]
China To Raise Ethylene Capacity By 71% In Major Self-Sufficiency Drive
By John Richardson CHINA could raise its ethylene capacity by as much as 71% and its propylene capacity by at least 21%, according to my latest analysis of a major new wave of naphtha, ethane and LPG crackers. The above chart is an update of the chart I first published back in June. In detail: […]
Climate Change, Extreme Weather: Implications For Chemicals Companies
By John Richardson The greater frequency of extreme weather events presents a huge challenge for chemicals companies. Take Hurricane Harvey and Hurricane Irma as the most obvious current examples. Weather forecasting service AccuWeather writes in this article: This is the first time in the history of record keeping that two Category 4 or higher hurricanes, […]
Tumbling Oil Prices: Implications For Asian Polyethylene
By John Richardson DON’T say that I didn’t warn you. Oil prices now look much more likely to hit my forecast of $35//bbl, or lower, by Q4. Such is the downward momentum right now in crude markets that it is perfectly possible that this price level will be breached well before then. As of Tuesday, […]
US Polyethylene Industry: Scenarios For 2017-2020
By John Richardson IT has been a remarkably strong few years for the US polyethylene (PE) business. The shale gas revolution has sent ethane costs plummeting, resulting in the kind of margins that you can see in the above chart. Lower oil prices have made naphtha cracking a lot more competitive of late, but the […]
Jump to page: