Japan’s Shin-etsu to complete US ethane cracker by end-’18

Pearl Bantillo

07-Dec-2018

SINGAPORE (ICIS)–Japanese producer Shin-etsu Chemical is looking at completing construction of its 500,000 tonne/year ethane cracker in the US by the end of the year, a company spokesperson said on Friday.

At the Bakken shale formation in the US. Asian petrochemical firms are building crackers in the US to take advantage of abundant ethane feedstock derived from shale. (Source: imageBROKER/REX/Shutterstock)

The company, via its US subsidiary Shintech, is building the cracker in Plaquemine, Louisiana, with a total project cost of about $1.4bn.

“Shintech is aiming to complete construction of the ethylene plant in end of 2018 and will make a trial operation after the completion,” the spokesperson said in an e-mailed response to ICIS query.

“We start and then [go into] trial production – we don’t know how long it will continue,” a company official told ICIS over the phone.

Meanwhile, Shintech’s construction of a new $1.49bn integrated polyvinyl chloride (PVC) plant at the same site is ongoing.

“Construction completion will be end of 2020,” the Shin-etsu official said.

The first phase of the project – which is located next to Shintech’s existing PVC plant – will increase the site’s PVC capacity by 290,000 tonnes/year and caustic soda capacity by 270,000 tonnes/year.

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