Transparent polymer film started with an accident . . . and spurred a packaging revolution One night in Paris, in 1900, Swiss chemist Jacques Brandenberger was enjoying dinner in a restaurant when he noticed that a fellow patron had spilled…
Heat transfer fluids (HTFs) provide heating and cooling of process equipment, including reactors, autoclaves, distillation columns, reboilers, mixers and dryers. HTF system designs should provide for effective system venting, both of residual water at startup and of degradation products during…
The Chemours Company (Wilmington, Del.) announced that it will be expanding its Chemours Opteon YF (HFO-1234yf) capacity to help meet customer needs as they continue transitioning to lower GWP refrigerants. The Opteon YF and YF blends refrigerants are now used…
INEOS (London) and Sinopec (Beijing, China) signed three back-to-back deals worth a combined value of $7 billion. These landmark agreements are expected to generate a combined turnover of around $10bn from 7 million tons of capacity. The three agreements will…
CP Kelco (Atlanta, Ga.) has made extensive progress in expanding biogums production capacity at two of its plant facilities: Okmulgee, Oklahoma, USA and Wulian, China. These expansion initiatives are integral pieces of the company’s significant, multi-year investment program focused on…
Cariflex Pte. Ltd. (Singapore), a wholly owned subsidiary of DL Chemical Co., broke ground at a 6.1-hectare site in Jurong Island, Singapore. Cariflex will be constructing the world’s largest and Singapore’s first polyisoprene latex plant on this site. Driven by…
Dow (Midland, Mich) and the Al-Hejailan Group signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to form a joint venture to design, build and operate a methyl diethanolamine (MDEA) plant in the PlasChem Park in Jubail, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. The joint…
Milliken & Company (Spartanburg, S.C.) is expanding the facilities and capacity it acquired last March via its purchase of Germany’s Zebra-chem GmbH. Zebra-chem is a specialty compounder and chemicals company that makes additive and blowing agent concentrates for polyolefins, PVC and engineering…
Wacker Chemie AG (Munich, Germany) is preparing to build a new silicone production complex at its Charleston site in Tennessee. The Munich-based chemical group has already started a feasibility study. In a first step, it is planned to build production…
The WeylChem Group of Companies (Frankfurt am Main, Germany) is set to invest around 15 million euros in upgrading its Glyoxal production in Lamotte, France. A process consolidation based on state-of-the-art equipment is going to increase production volumes by approximately…