Indorama Group has completed its acquisition of the integrated PET polymers plant of Compañía Española de Petróleos group (CEPSA) near Cadiz in southern Spain.
Thailand-based Indorama took over the Guadarranque-San Roque chemicals complex, which produces both PET and its raw materials purified terephthalic acid (PTA) and purified isophthalic acid (PIA), on April 7.
The facility, representing CEPSA's last link with PET polymer production, has plant capacities of 175,000 metric tons per year for PET, 325,000 tonnes per year of PTA and 220,000 tonnes per year of PIA, is to be renamed Indorama Ventures Quimica.
No financial details of the takeover by Indorama group offshoot Indorama Ventures Ltd. (IVL) were disclosed.
The San Roque site, which employs 230, is integrated with a CEPSA refinery that supplies para-xylene and meta-xylene feedstock via a pipeline. CEPSA was Europe's only PIA manufacturer and ranked second worldwide.
Indorama views this product, half of which is a PET intermediate and the other half used in end products such as paints, as a valuable additional asset. The Spanish firm had its own advanced patented technology for PIA which presented a strong barrier to entry, according to IVL.
“This acquisition provides Indorama Ventures with a stronger base in Europe and will allow us to simplify logistics costs in the region,” IVL chief executive Aloke Lohia said in a news release. “The addition of isophthalic acid gives us a high-value-added business that is a good fit in our international strategy.”
Indorama, which last year acquired another CEPSA operation, the 600,000 tonnes per year PTA plant in Montreal, sees some debottlenecking opportunities at the Spanish petrochemicals plant to improve efficiency.
Indorama group also operates a 400,000 tonnes per year PET facility at Rotterdam in the Netherlands which it acquired from Eastman Chemicals in 2008 and expanded in 2013. Today, the firm also has PET plants in Poland, Italy, Lithuania and Turkey as well as a PET preforms and bottle production unit in Northern Ireland.
