Insights

Reliance Industry Ltd (RIL) and Sibur have decided to invest $450 million in a Butyl Rubber production unit at Jamnagar, India. To do so, RIL and Sibur have created a (74.9%/ 25.1%) joined venture called Reliance Sibur Elastomers Pvt Ltd. This new Butyl Rubber facility will have a capacity of 100 000 t/y and will […]

Definition: In the petrochemical industry “C4” refers to the branch of Olefins which begins with C4…. in their chemical formulas. C4 is used to nominated the Butadiene and all its derivatives Comments:  Among the C4 family, the mostly used products are the Butylene isomers such as, Isoprene, Butyl Rubber (BTR), Styrene, Styrene Butadiene Rubber (SBR) and […]

Total Petrochemicals and the Shaw Group have announced to create an exclusive Alliance for the marketing and licensing of the Total Polystyrene (PS) technology Worldwide. Total Petrochemicals’ polystyrene technology produces both general purpose polystyrene, a rigid and transparent material used in applications such as insulation and packaging (transparent containers and boxes), and high impact polystyrene, […]

Definition: The “Polystyrene” belongs to the Aromatics family (BTX) by the Benzene. Polystyrene is a polymer of the Styrene as monomer where the Styrene itself is produced by dehydrogenation from the Ethylbenzene, a combination of Benzene and Ethylene.  Comments:  Polystyrene is a plastic made by polymerising styrenes. It is made in two types: a “crystal” polystyrene (extremely transparent) and […]

On October 1st, 2011 , Basf and Ineos created officially a 50/50 joined venture called Styrolution to merge and promote all their Styrene activities.  As a result Styrolution is the only one of the key players dedicated entirely to styrenics, and a strong leader in the market. It holds global number one positions in styrene monomer […]

The TPC Group is a leader in C4 and C3 hydrocarbons operating world scale dehydrogenation facilities .  Processing 30-40% of the CC4 in North America, TPC has multiple units to extract and produce Butadiene at Houston and Port Neches operating facilities. The company declared to “move forward” with studies to restart two idled production units of on-purpose Butadiene and […]

Definition: “Butadiene” is the head of the C4 olefins family. Butadiene is a gas that condensates at -4.5°C. Mainly produced as byproducts from Ethylene by Ethane by steam cracking at high temperature (900°C), the Butadiene can also be obtained by Butane dehydrogenation or from Ethanol. Comments: Butadiene is mostly converted into Styrene Butadiene or Styrene Butadiene Rubber (SBR) more well known as synthetic Rubber  Polybutadiene is also used […]

The Japanese JSR Corporation and Bangkok Synthetics Corporation (BST)  have created a  joined venture (51%/49%) in June 2011 called the JSR BST Elastomer Co. to build the first Solution Polymerization Styrene-Butadiene Rubber (S-SBR) plant in Map Ta Phut, Rayong Province, Thailand. S-SBR is a high-performance synthetic rubber used mainly in tires and industrial goods for which the […]

Grace & Co and Al Dahra have signed a joined venture to build and operate in Abu Dhabi, UAE,  a new plant to produce Catalysts and Additives With this new facility, Grace & Co and Al Dahra are targeting to supply some of the 16 Fluid Catalytic Cracking (FCC) units  to come in the next five years in the Gulf. This plant […]

Definition: “Propylene” is the common name given to the Propene. It is a gas, not to be confused with the Propane. Propylene may also be called Methylethylene.  Comments: From process perspective, the Propylene is a byproduct as produced in parallel of the Ethylene during the cracking operations in the steam cracker as shown in the flowchart above. […]