Business

Update
OMV Launches First Installation
of UOP’s Newest FCC Catalyst
UOP LLC’s (Des Plaines;
www.uop.com) newest advanced
reforming catalyst, R-264, has been
successfully demonstrated at the com-
PLANTS AND PROJECTS mercial scale for the first time in the
Eastman Doubles Capacity of continuous catalytic cracking unit at
Plasticizer Precursor in Kingsport OMV AG’s (Vienna, Austria;
A debottlenecking effort will enable www.omv.com) Schwechat, Austria,
Eastman Chemical Co. (Kingsport, refinery. According to OMV, the cata-
Crompton Corp.’s Geismar, LA, plant is adding
TN; www.eastman.com) to double the equipment to increase antioxidant production.
lyst is meeting all expectations, includ-
production capacity for 2-ethyl hexa- ing high activity, density, and selectiv-
noic acid (2EH), a plasticizer precur- that has been used to produce a rubber ity, and low coke-forming properties.
sor used during the production of auto- chemicals intermediate (4-ADPA) This affords an improved operating
motive and architectural safety glass, used in the company’s Flexzone prod- flexibility to refiners who want to
at its Kingsport facility. The first part uct line. Crompton plans to reduce a increase throughput or increase yields
of this two-phase project, which will portion of 4-ADPA production by the of gasoline, aromatics and hydrogen.
result in a final output of 80 million end of the year.
lb/yr, will be completed in early 2005. Petrochemical Incubator
Paratherm Assures Unwavering Materializes in Shanghai
Crompton Plans to Boost Output of Service During Company Expansion The Shanghai Jinshan District
Antioxidants at Geismar Site Paratherm Corp. (Conshohocken, PA; Government (Shanghai, China;
Crompton Corp.’s (Middlebury, CT; www.paratherm.com) is expanding its www.sohu.com) has announced the
www.cromptoncorp.com) Petroleum facility by moving to a 30,000-ft2 lot in establishment of a new enterprise in the
Additives business has announced West Conshohocken, PA. During this Jinshan district of China — home to
plans to invest in a new Naugalube time, there will be no interruption of Shanghai Chemical Industrial Park and
alkylated diphenylamine (ADPA) business activity or inconvenience to Sinopec Shanghai Petrochemical Co. —
antioxidant production unit at its exist- customers, as all lines of communica- to accelerate the formation of a chemi-
ing manufacturing facility in Geismar, tions — phone, fax, and Internet — cal industrial zone aimed at developing
LA, which is expected to start-up in will remain the same. The rapid environmentally friendly petrochemical
mid-2005. This brownfield investment growth of its business in the past few technology and promoting industrial
is primarily an ongoing response to years, such as the addition of fluids for integration. Called Shanghai Jinshan
customers’ fast-changing requirements cryogenic services (namely, process Petrochemical Incubator Co., the firm is
brought on by GF-4 automotive motor temperatures ranging from –148°F to the product of a $0.76 million joint
oil specifications for the North 650°F), coupled with expanded per- investment of the Shanghai High-Tech
American market rolled out in July of sonnel and increased space needs for Business Incubator Network, the
this year. Naugalube ADPA produc- research, manufacturing and ware- Shanghai Research Institute of
tion will utilize some of the equipment housing necessitated the change. Chemical Industry, the Jinshan District
High-Tech Business Incubator Center,
Dow Expands Production of PP in Columbia and PE in Spain and the Shanghai Jinshanwei Industrial

T he Dow Chemical Company (Midland, MI; www.dow.com) and Polipropileno

Cartagena, Columbia, that uses Unipol PP process technology. The expansion, MERGERS AND
which will increase PP production from 120 kton/yr to 200 kton/yr is expected to ACQUISITIONS
be completed in early 2006. Propilco will also purchase Dow’s proprietary AirQual Purchases Antimicrobial
Unippac automated process control package. Designed and configured for plants Powders from DuPont
that implement Unipol, this Windows NT-based program seamlessly integrates AirQual Corp. (Canton, MA;
with plant automation and enterprise resource planning information systems to im- www.airqual.net) has acquired the sil-
prove operating reliability with minimal product variation or downtime. ver-based antimicrobial powder tech-
Dow also plans to build a polyethylene train at its Tarragona, Spain, site to sup- nology of DuPont Chemical Solutions
port the growing demand for polymers for high-performance films, consumer Enterprise (DCSE; Wilmington, DE;
products and industrial applications. The facility is expected to come on-stream in www.dupont.com), formerly marketed
the second quarter of 2006 with a production capacity of 661.4 million lb/yr. under the DuPont MicroFree brand-
name. AirQual will be offering the tech-

14 www.cepmagazine.org December 2004 CEP

J ust one year after announcing their alliance, AVEVA Group plc (Houston, TX;
www.aveva.com), an engineering information technology solutions and services
provider, and Autodesk, Inc. (San Rafael, CA; www.autodesk.com), a computer-aid-
which Rohm and Haas and ADM will
contribute $1.75 million) is expected to
save the paints and coatings industry up
ed design software and digital content solutions provider, unveiled two technologies to 86 trillion Btu/yr.
for the process, power and marine industries — respectively called Vantage Plant
Engineering P&ID and Final Designer — that illustrate the synergy of formerly … And Bolsters SpecialChem’s Online
incompatible approaches to digital plant design. Traditionally, companies have either Solutions to Coatings Formulators
indexed vital information onto drawings or extracted completed drawings after hav- SpecialChem S.A. (Paris, France;
ing built an accurate digital model. Vantage Plant Engineering P&ID features a www.specialchem4coatings.com) has
schematic drawing solution that can be used offline by anyone familiar with formed a partnership with the Rohm and
AutoCAD software and then synchronized with the master project database through Haas Co. in Europe to offer water-based
a sophisticated control procedure. Final Designer delivers an AutoCAD interface for solutions developed from 100% acrylic
the enhancement of final construction drawings, which synchronize with subsequent technology to coatings formulators
changes to the master plant model. online. Water-based acrylic coatings are
Together with Quantapoint, Inc. (Pittsburgh, PA; www.quantapoint.com), a known to be durable, flexible, and envi-
provider of as-built documentation, the firm’s announced a technology and marketing ronmentally friendly, while exhibiting
alliance to closely integrate Quantapoint’s PRISM 3D software with AVEVA’s gloss-retention, surface-adhesion and
Vantage Plant Design Management System (PDMS). PRISM 3D captures and shares chemical resistance in a variety of for-
as-built information from a photo-realistic 3D image of laser scan data and is currently mulations, substrates and conditions.
the only software to display and perform clash detection of PDMS models with laser
scan data. Closer integration of the products will result in fewer personnel collecting Genencor Makes Strides in the
data in the plant and decreased design modeling time, while tighter integration between Conversion of Biomass to Ethanol
laser scan data and design review environments will reduce time spent on rework. Genencor International, Inc. (Palo Alto,
CA; www.genencor.com) and DOE’s
nology under the ACT brand to a broad National Renewable Energy Laboratory
range of manufacturers of paints and JOINT VENTURES (NREL; Washington, DC; www.nrel.
coatings, building materials and other AND ALLIANCES gov) have completed a four-year col-
products to provide protection against Rohm and Haas Receives $3.75 M laboration to reduce the costs of
mold, mildew, bacteria and fungi. from DOE to Develop New Coatings ... enzymes that will enable a commercial-
Rohm and Haas Co. (Philadelphia, PA; ly viable cellulosic biomass-to-ethanol
Borden Chemical Acquires Bakelite www.rohmhaas.com) has been awarded technology. Genencor has achieved an
Borden Chemical, Inc. (Columbus, OH; a $3.75 million grant from the Dept. of estimated cellulase cost of $0.10–
www.bordenchem.com) has signed a Energy’s (DOE; Washington, DC; $0.20/gal of ethanol, as per NREL’s
definitive agreement to acquire Bakelite www.doe.gov) Industrial Technologies cost model. This represents an approxi-
AG (Iserlohn-Letmathe, Germany; Program to develop new polymer tech- mate 30-fold improvement in enzyme
www.bakelite.de), a producer of pheno- nologies for paints and coatings that can cost in that model. NREL is expected to
lic and epoxy thermosetting resins and eliminate up to 30% of the raw materials validate these results at pilot scale with-
molding compounds, from its parent used in theses coatings’ formulations. in the next few months.
company, Rütgers AG. Borden expects Waterborne coatings use polymer emul-
the investment to expand its international sions to bind color pigments and other Great Lakes Joins Teijin Chemicals
operations, particularly in Europe and paint ingredients together, and to help to Market Flame Retardants
Asia, while extending its range of tech- the resulting pigment/binder film adhere Great Lakes Chemical Corp. (Düsseldorf,
nology solutions into epoxy resins. to a substrate. But, only the outer surface Germany; www.greatlakes.com) and
of each emulsion particle is actually Teijin Chemicals Ltd. (Chiyoda, Japan;
GEA Gains Ground in Process used. Working with Archer Daniels www.teijinkasei.co.jp) will combine their
Equipment with WTT Acquisition Midland (ADM; Decatur, IL; www. global brominated carbonate oligomer
GEA Group (Hudson, WI; www.geafil- admworld.com) and the Univ. of activities as part of a 50:50 joint venture
tration.com) has acquired WTT Minnesota (Minneapolis; www.umn. to market flame retardants for various
Wilchwitzer Thermo-Technik GmbH edu), Rohm and Haas will match its engineering polymers and blends, includ-
(WTT; Nobitz-Wilchwitz, Germany; water-based polymeric binders with new ing polybutylene terephalate and polycar-
www.wttglobal.de), a manufacturer of biomass-derived coalescing agents to bonate resins, for use in electronic com-
soldered-plate heat exchangers. This deliver architectural paints and coatings ponents. The new entity, to be based in
acquisition, still subject to approval by that offer breakthrough performance, Japan, will commence in the second quar-
the antitrust authorities, will strengthen and are both environmentally friendly ter of 2005. Great Lakes will be the firm’s
GEA’s process equipment division. and cost efficient. The technology borne exclusive sales agent.

CEP December 2004 www.cepmagazine.org 15