BASF SE and its joint venture partner China Petroleum & Chemical Corp. (Sinopec) have broken ground on the construction of a world-scale isononanol (INA) plant in China.
INA is the feedstock for BASF's next generation of plasticizers, which include diisononyl phthalate (DINP) and its non-phthalate plasticizer Hexamoll DINCH.
The plant is being built in the Maoming industrial development zone. At start-up in 2015, the plant will create around 100 new jobs.
BASF and Sinopec have a longtime partnership and jointly operate BASF-YPC Co, a 50-50 joint venture formed in 2000 in Nanjing.