AKRON, OHIO — The latest in a line of polyethylene capacity additions is featured in this week's Material Insights video.
Global chemical firms Sasol Ltd. and Ineos Group have formed a joint venture to build a plant with annual capacity of more than 1 billion pounds of high density PE at a site in Louisiana. The site will make a limited number of grades for high efficiency and is expected to be open by the end of 2015. The new plant and several others are being made possible by newfound discoveries of shale gas throughout North America.
A possible plastics-related sale and good news for the U.S. resin sector also are featured in this week's video. DuPont Co. is considering selling some or all of its Performance Chemicals unit because of poor financial results. The unit includes Teflon-brand fluoropolymer as well as titanium dioxide, a common whitener. The positive resin report comes from the American Chemistry Council, which points out that the U.S. resin market's 2012 sales total of $87.1 billion was 85 percent higher than its level of ten years ago.
The video wraps up with news that a federal jury in Austin, Texas, has ruled in favor of Eastman Chemical. The firm had alleged that technology firms PlastiPure and CertiChem had made false and misleading statements about Eastman's Tritan-brand copolyester.