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Chemical Activity Barometer shows gain in May, ACC says

The Chemical Activity Barometer (CAB), a leading economic indicator created by the American Chemistry Council (ACC; Washington, D.C.; www.americanchemistry.com), rose 0.4 percent in May on a three-month moving average (3MMA) basis, the third monthly gain after several weak months. On…

Advanced Battery Systems emerges from stealth, acquires Bosch assets

American Battery Solutions, Inc. (ABS; Lake Orion, Mich.; www.absbattery.com), an advanced battery systems company, announced its emergence from stealth-mode today with engineering, testing and manufacturing services enabled by an agreement to acquire of high-voltage manufacturing and testing assets from Robert…

U.S. plastic resin production in March down from a year ago, ACC says

  U.S. production of major plastic resins totaled 7.5 billion pounds during March 2019, a decrease of 0.3 percent compared to the same month in 2018, according to statistics released today by the American Chemistry Council (ACC; Washington, D.C.; www.americanchemistry.com).…

Hyundai Chemical selects Unipol PE technology for new HDPE plant

  Hyundai Chemical Company, Ltd. (Daesan, South Korea; www.hyundaicorp.com/en/business/chemical) has chosen Univation Technologies’ (Houston; www.univation.com) UNIPOL PE Technology for a 300 kTA (kilotons per year) high-density polyethylene (HDPE) plant to be located at Hyundai’s site in Daesan, Republic of Korea.…

Emerson receives automation contract for BASF specialty chemicals site

  As part of its five-year investment to boost capacity and operational excellence within its global plastics additives business, BASF SE (Ludwigshafen, Germany; www.basf.com) has awarded Emerson (St. Louis, Mo.; www.emerson.com) a multi-million dollar contract to modernize automation software and…

2019 CEPCI Updates: March (prelim.) and February (final)

The preliminary value for the CE Plant Cost Index (CEPCI; the most recent available) for March 2019 decreased from the previous month’s value for the second consecutive month, although the final value for February was adjusted slightly upward. The decline…

Lotte Chemical and Westlake Chemical host grand opening ceremony for new chemical complex in Louisiana

Lotte Chemical USA (Lake Charles, La.; www.lottechem.com) and Westlake Chemical Corp. (Houston, Tex.; www.westlake.com) hosted an official opening ceremony on May 9, 2019, for their joint-venture Ethylene and the Lotte Chemical world-scale Ethylene Glycol (EG) Production Facility near Lake Charles,…

Trey Walters named ASME Fellow

Trey Walters, P.E., President and Founder of Applied Flow Technology (AFT; Colorado Springs, Colo.; www.aft.com), has been named a Fellow of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME). This recognition is the society's highest membership grade of distinction. Trey is one…

TASI Group acquires Sierra Instruments

The TASI Group (Harrison, Ohio; www.tasigroup.com) continues the growth of its Flow Segment business with the recent acquisition of Sierra Instruments, Sierra Instruments Inc. (Monterey, Calif.; www.sierrainstruments.com), a global company specializing in the manufacture of flow measurement instrumentation.  This is…

ExxonMobil doubles manufacturing capacity of specialty elastomers at Wales plant

  ExxonMobil (Irving, Texas; www.exxonmobil.com) said today it has completed an expansion of its specialty elastomers manufacturing plant in Newport, Wales, which doubles the plant’s manufacturing capacity and increases global manufacturing capacity of Santoprene thermoplastic elastomers by 25 percent. “ExxonMobil’s…