January’s top news stories – Auto Republish

Bharat Petroleum Corporation Limited (BPCL) awarded a project management consultancy services contract to Fluor for its petrochemicals project in India.

Under the contract, Flour will provide front-end engineering and design (FEED) of both the inside and outside battery limits for BPCL’s Polyols Petrochemicals Project located at its existing integrated refinery and petrochemicals complex in Kochi, Kerala.

In addition, the company will be responsible for providing detailed design, engineering, procurement and construction management services for the facility’s utilities and offsites.

US-based chemical manufacturing company Huntsman closed the sale of its chemical intermediates and surfactant businesses to Thailand-based Indorama Ventures Public Company Limited (IVL) for approximately $2.076bn.

The deal includes a cash purchase price of $2bn, as well as a transfer of around $76m in net underfunded pension.

A definitive agreement was signed by the two firms in August last year.

Pembina Pipeline signed a lump sum engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contract with Canadian Kuwait Petrochemical (CKPC) for a petrochemical facility in Canada.

Pembina and Kuwait’s Petrochemical Industries Company (PIC) reached an agreement to establish a C$4.5bn ($3.41bn) integrated petrochemical facility in Alberta, Canada, in February last year.

Founded in 2017, CKPC is a joint venture between Pembina Pipeline and PIC.

Trade union United Steelworks (USW) sued the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in a bid to save a chemical disaster regulation.

The lawsuit was filed in the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.

In November, EPA removed chemical plants disaster rules from its latest release of the Risk Management Program.

High flaring started at ExxonMobil Chemical’s Fife ethylene plant (FEP) in Mossmorran, Scotland, as the facility resumes operations following its recent closure.

ExxonMobil warned the public to expect increased flaring as part of the restart process. Two boilers at the plant were subject to a breakdown in August and were accompanied by explosions.

The Scottish Environmental Protection Agency (SEPA) said it is continuing its deployment of air quality monitoring in various locations surrounding the site.

Irish-based multinational chemical company Linde launched a new air separation plant in China.

The facility will supply nitrogen, high purity oxygen and argon to Shanghai-based Huali Microelectronics Corporation’s (HLMC) 12-in wafer product line. HLMC is a subsidiary of Chinese semiconductor manufacturer Huahong Group.

Chemicals company Showa Denko decided to streamline the domestic production of unsaturated polyester resin (UP) and vinyl ester resin (VE) in Japan.

UP serves as a molding material for automotive parts, housing and construction materials, while VE is used as a corrosion-resistant and electronic material.

The company said it will terminate its production line operations to synthesise UP and VE at its Isesaki plant by the end of June 2021.

German specialty chemicals company Lanxess completed the sale of its chrome chemicals business to Chinese leather chemicals producer Brother Enterprises for €80m ($89m).

The deal was first announced on 12 August last year, when the two companies signed an agreement.

Lanxess noted that the transaction obtained all the necessary approvals from the relevant antitrust authorities.