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A route to bioplastics using limonene oxide is under development at Cornell University in New York. Limonene is a carbon compound found in more than 300 plant species - it makes up more than 95 per cent of the oil in the peel of oranges, for instance. The research team polymerises limonene oxide and carbon dioxide in the presence of a catalyst to produce polylimonene carbonate which has many of the characterisics of polystyrene.
Ticona to off-load COC business as Celanese goes public January 18, 2005
Ticona is to dispose of its loss-making cyclo-olefin polymer business as part of a restructure ahead of a public flotation of its parent Celanese Corporation. The flotation was announced last November and scheduled for later this month. The surprise announcement came only months after American financial investor Blackstone completed its takeover of Celanese, which at the time of its initial bid it said it expected to hold for at least five years.
Since completing the takeover of Celanese AG in April last year Blackstone has split the company into two under the holding company Celanese Corporation. The American companies have been grouped in Celanese Americas Corp while the smaller European operation remains as Celanese AG. Celanese Corporation owns only 84 per cent of Celanese AG, but is intending to withdraw it from the Frankfurt stock market where it is currently listed. Celanese Corporation will then be the only Celanese shares publicly traded.
When the flotation was announced in November Celanese expected to raise around $750 million, but the the expected offer of 57·5 million shares at a price of $19 to $21 each would value the company at around $1·2 billion. Much of the cash raised will be paid back to Blackstone - which has already taken a large special dividend from Celanese.
The planned disposal of the Topas COC business - and Ticona's much publicised investment in fuel cell development through its Pemeas joint venture - was agreed at the end of last year and announced in a revised offer document filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission at the end of last week. Celanese says the COC business lost $35 million in 2003 and $27 million in the first nine months of last year. The fuel cell business lost $12 million in 2003 and $7 million up to September 2004.
The flotation is expected to take place on January 25.
Klöckner buys into blown film with Nordpack takeover January 18, 2005
The Klöckner Pentaplast Group has taken over Finnish packaging film companies Nordpak and Avanspack. The two companies are not related, but work closely together. Nordpak produces flexible multi-layer barrier films and Avanspack prints and laminates them.
Klöckner Pentaplast has 25 plants world-wide producing rigid film for packaging and other technical applications. The addition of Nordpack brings it into blown film for the first time.
The two new companies have around 100 employees between them and turn over in excess of Eur 30 m. Klöckner Pentaplast has 3,800 employees with an annual turnover of Eur 1 billion.
Solvay to sell rigid films businesses to Ineos January 18, 2005
Solvay is to sell its Italian rigid films companies Adriaplast and Caleppiovinil to Ineos. Rigid films represent only a small interest to Solvay, but within Ineos the two companies would represent a significant downstream activity for its EVC vinyls business - EVC already has activities in rigid films. Turnover of the two companies in 2004 was Eur 62 million with 235 employees.
The old guard has moved over at Arburg, and the younger generation of the Hehl family have taken over management of the family-owned German moulding machine manufacturer.
Michael Hehl took on the role of spokesperson for the newly-formed corporate management team at the beginning of the year in place of his father Eugen and his uncle Karl Hehl, who now take on take on advisory roles within the management team.
Michael Hehl's sister Juliane Hehl will continue to be responsible for the company's Marketing division. Renate Keinath, the daughter of Karl Hehl, will take on responsibility for the human resources division in her role as a managing partner.
Outside the family, Michael Grandt will now be concentrating more on the accounts and controlling division and has passed the management of the sales division on to Helmut Heinson, who joined the company at the beginning of the year. Herbert Kraibühler remains responsible for the technical department.
Capacity expansion for body armour plastics
January 15, 2005
DSM is to add more capacity to its Dyneema high performance polyethylene fibre and UD unidirectional bullet resistant sheet production at its Greenville, North Carolina, USA plant. The fibre line came on stream in May last year along with an expansion of the bullet resistant sheet facility. The expansion, expected to be operational by the start of next year, will increase global fibre capacity by about 20 per cent and UD capacity by 25 per cent.
The main driver is the production of personal armour, principally for the US military.
Plastics exhibitions proliferate January 15, 2005
The PDM - Plastic Design & Moulding - exhibition scheduled for Telford for April 12 - 14 this year will be followed by a similar event, also at the Telford International Centre, on September 26 - 28, 2006. Organiser Emap says the event will take place on an approximately 18 month cycle to avoid running in the same year as the K show. The next K exhibition in Germany will be on October 24 - 31, 2007. In Britain Interplas will take place on October 4 - 6 this year, and then again on October 7 - 9, 2008. Interplas organiser Reed Exhibitions has said it will stage some kind of associated event in 2006 and 2007, but just what, when and where has yet to be decided.
Printed plastic electronic label 'could replace bar codes' January 14, 2005
A German company partly owned by stamping foil manufacturer Leonhard Kurz has produced a plastic RFID chip which it expects to become available commercially next year. The intention is to replace bar codes, which can typically store 44 bits, with labels that have up to 128 bits of memory.
The PolyIC company of Erlangen, a joint venture between Siemens Automation and Drives and Leonhard Kurz, says this is the world's fastest (600 kHz) integrated circuit made of organic material and that it marks the first use of printing techniques to produce highly stable circuits made of polymers - the circuits are printed on to film with a long term target cost of 1 cent per chip.
Increasing the memory of a cheap label is expected to open up more sophisticated means of delivery and inventory management, and make possible automated checkout lines where the contents of a shopping trolley can be identifed by a single pass by a scanner.
Biopolymer blended into computer housing January 14, 2005
A notebook computer is about to go on sale in Japan with a case containing a bio-sourced plastic. The Fujitsu FMV-BIBLO NB80K will have a housing moulded from a blend of a Ecodear polylactic acid from Toray, and a 'non-crystalline plastic' with a high glass transition temperature and flame-retardant technology. The material achieves the heat resistance and flame retardance mandatory for a large-size housing for IT devices, with easy mouldability, making it suitable for mass production.
Roughly half of the new alloy consists of plant-based material and Fujitsu says that when used to manufacture a notebook PC, CO2 emissions over the product's lifecycle are reduced by roughly 15 per cent. Fujitsu and Toray plan to expand the range of uses for this new material as a way to further reduce the overall environmental burden and consumption of petroleum resources in the IT industry.
Fujitsu has used biopolymers before, but for smaller components - in June 2002, Fujitsu and Fujitsu Laboratories used polylactic acid for a component in an earlier FMV-BIBLO notebook PC.
Enercon absorbs Ahlbrand in the UK January 13, 2005
Enercon Industries is now selling corona treatment equipment in the UK following the takeover of its close neighbour Ahlbrand Systems UK. Both companies shared the same address in Aylesbury and managing director of Enercon Industries Richard Bull was the major shareholder in Ahlbrand Systems UK - other shares being held by corona equipment manufacturer Ahlbrand of Germany.
Enercon supplies corona treatment equipment in the USA, but has not done so in the UK, its major product line here being cap sealing equipment. Enercon is now offering a full range of surface treating equipment that includes atmospheric plasma, gas flame, covered-roll corona, bare-roll corona and universal corona discharge plus Dyne-A-mite 3D systems across Europe.
XL Plastic Technologies, which was formed last year with the merger of Excel Technical Mouldings of Paignton and Plastic Technologies of West Bromwich, has been placed in administration and is being offered for sale. The company employs 120 people on a 6½ acre site in Smethwick, which includes 148,000 ft² of manufacturing and warehousing space. It has injection moulding machines from 22 to 3,150 tonnes with automatic material feed, and robotic part removal. Administrator Menzies Corporate Restructuring says the company has a strong order book and that recent annual turnover was in the region of £10 million.
Robot maker expands range by acquisition January 13, 2005
Swiss industrial robot maker Stäubli, which includes robots specifically designed for plastics processing in its range, has bought the robotics activities of Bosch-Rexroth of Germany. The addition of Bosch-Rexroth's SCARA robot technology gives Stäubli a range of products from four to six axis robots.
Business blossoms in building profiles January 13, 2005
Belgium-based extrusion group Deceuninck grew its turnover last year by 24 per cent to Eur 582 million. The added turnover from Thyssen Polymer is still inflating year on year comparisons, but Deceuninck says that business overall for window frames and other construction profiles improved.
Belgium, France and Spain were mainly responsible for growth in Western Europe; in Eastern Europe the Czech Republic, Hungary and Slovakia brought sales increases of 30 per cent; Turkey saw a 50 per cent growth, although there was some influence from the addition of Winsa; there was a slight increase in the USA - negated by currency effects - and encouraging response to the recently introduced wood decking products, for which Deceuninck is planning to double capacity this year; sales in Russia were on target and the company is continuing with its plan to start manufacture in Moscow.
Continuing investment and streamlining are predicted to bring further growth in 2005.
New York plumbers want plastic piping ban January 11, 2005
The safety of plastic water pipe is being disputed in New York State, USA, where plumbing companies are deciding whether to fight a relaxation of the use of plastic pipe in large buildings.
Plastic pipe is allowed in all construction everywhere else in the USA, but in New York State it has, since 1999, been illegal to use it in other than one- or two-family houses. The ban ended on January 1 after Governor George Pataki vetoed a move to extend it for another three years.
The Plumbing and Mechanical Contractors Association wants the ban to continue on safety grounds citing a 1994 study by the US Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). It argues that plastic pipes penetrating the structure of a building represent a fire risk. Builders groups point to the lower cost of using plastics plumbing, and say that plastics pipes could save $50 m a year in New York State - excluding New York City.
The plumbers counter-claim that these savings are reduced substantially by the need to provide firestop at all points of penetration, but an American firestop sealant manufacturer - Hilti Inc - says that whereas once the use of plastics plumbing did call for more firestop 'today's plastic piping does not require any more firestop than metal'.
Another link claimed between polycarbonate and cancer January 10, 2005
More weight has been added to the arguments over the health issues surrounding bisphenol A - from which polycarbonate is made, but also used in the manufacture of epoxy resins, polysulphone, polyalylate, and some polyesters. Bisphenol A has been claimed to cause birth defects and also to play a part in the occurrence of prostate cancer.
The latest claims come from the American Association for Cancer Research, a society of more than 24,000 laboratory, translational, and clinical scientists engaged in all areas of cancer research in the United States and more than 60 other countries.
In its January issue of Cancer Research the association says that treatment of a form of prostate cancer can be negatively affected by exposure to bisphenol A, such as through exposure to leachates from polycarbonate food storage containers. The study shows that this particular form of prostate cancer cell, characterized by mutated receptors for androgens, the male hormone, can proliferate in response to BPA. 'Many cases of prostate cancer depend on androgens like testosterone for tumour growth and cancer cell proliferation', said Dr Karen Knudsen, the study's senior author. 'A common treatment for prostate cancer includes limiting testosterone synthesis. Patients with mutated androgen receptors may not respond to this therapy and according to this new study, exposure to BPA among these patients could potentially put them at higher risk for increased cancer cell growth'.
Icon buys another rubber business January 10, 2005
The Icon Group, which in the past four years has bought three rubber processing companies has now bought a fourth - the Silvertown Group in Burton upon Trent - for £10 million.
Silvertown employs more than 200 people and has annual sales of around £13 million. The company had already agreed to sell its site for residential development and Icon is now exploring options to resettle the business, with a decision expected in the Spring.
This acquisition raises Icon's annual sales to around £35 million.
Window blinds react to light intensity January 10, 2005
Coating machinery specialist Web Processing Machinery has developed a process for coating roller and vertical blind fabrics with a polychromatic material to adjust the translucency of the blinds to match the strength of sunlight they are meant to block, giving an optimum level of shading on alternating bright sunlight and cloudy days. The company is considering offering the technology for license.
Packaging equipment suppliers merge January 10, 2005
Two British suppliers of packaging-related equipment have merged. WLT, which sells static control systems, greeting cards wrapping machines, feeders, film banding and overwrapping equipment has merged with Crusader Europe, a supplier of bespoke labelling, checkweighing and product handling systems, to form Advanced Dynamics. The two companies had worked previously on line projects combining machines from their complementary product portfolios. Advanced Dynamics is operating from the WLT site in Bradford.
Among companies represented by the new company are Simco, KöRa-Packmat, ABG-Packmat, AL.MA, Eurokett, Schafer Etiketten, Tesab and Pelletron.
DuPont and Dow to carve up elastomers joint venture January 10, 2005
DuPont Dow Elastomers is to be split up in June with its portfolio being broadly returned to its founding partners. The company was founded in 1996 with the aim of achieving elastomers development strength greater than the sum of its parts. Dow Chemical contributed ethylene and chlorinated elastomer technology while DuPont put in its chloroprene and fluoroelastomers.
Last year the two equal partners agreed an option for Dow to buy back the ethylene and chlorinated elastomers business. This option is now to be exercised, with Dow buying the businesses - including the Engage, Nordel and Tyrin products - for an undisclosed sum 'involving Dow's equity interest in DDE', and DuPont buying Dow's remaining interest in the company for $87 m. After the transaction, slated for June 30, the company will become a wholly owned subsidiary of DuPont with a new name, returning the Neoprene, Hypalon, Kalrez and Viton brands to the DuPont stable.
M & G names site for world's biggest PET plant January 10, 2005
The world's largest PET plant planned for South America by M & G will be built near the town of Ipojuca in the State of Pernambuco in North Eastern Brazil. The new plant will have a capacity of 450,000 tonnes and is expected to come on-stream in late 2006. M & G has also signed a memorandum of understanding with Petrobras to start the evaluation of possible joint investments upstream in the PET chain.
Hostalen plant planned for Iran January 10, 2005
A 300,000 tonnes HDPE plant is to be built by National Petrochemical Company at the Garb Petrochemical Complex in Iran using Basell's bimodal Hostalen technology. Start up is planned for 2007. The new plant will be part of NPC's 11th olefins project.
Chronos Richardson enters Iranian market January 10, 2005
The Chronos Richardson Batching Systems Group has secured its first order for a rubber mixing line for Iran. The contract, for automotive component manufacturer Part Lastic Group, is valued at more than $400,000. It includes a Chronos Clean-Feed system for the Part Lastic factory in Mashhad, which manufacturers hoses, extruded profiles, gaskets and assorted moulded parts. This will be used to upgrade an existing manually-fed mixing system and will help the company meet its quality control commitments.
Thompson adds equipment to increase vehicle component forming capacity January 10, 2005
Thompson Plastics Group has expanded the thermoforming capability at its Vehicle Products Division's Hessle site near Hull. It has invested £500,000 on a new thermoformer and two five axis CNC trimming machines from Geiss. The former has increased the forming capacity at the factory by a sixth, while the two CNC machines have increased CNC trimming capacity by a third. Twenty new jobs have also been created. The investment is to meet increasing volumes from construction, agricultural and passenger transport vehicle manufacturers for which Thompson Plastics manufactures roofs, hoods, fenders and a range of interior and under bonnet components.
Getting colder up north January 10, 2005
Cooling equipment supplier Aqua Cooling Solutions has opened a northern office at the Shaw Park Business Centre in Huddersfield. It will stock a range of spare parts and consumables, including specialist inhibited glycols, as well as having several packaged chillers on site for demonstration. The telephone number is 01484 539360. Aqua has also added a new range of temperature controllers, marketed under the Aqua Temp brand name.
US vinyl and TPE specialist Teknor Apex has bought the Chem Polymer Group, until a parting of the ways in 2003 the engineering plastics compounding arm of the BIP Group (BIP's thermoset materials business was placed in administration in November last year and bought a month later by Tennant Group subsidiary Synthite, a major producer of formaldehyde).
Chem Polymer was the name adopted in 2003 to replace BIP Plastex, both names reflecting engineering plastics businesses bought by BIP in the 1980s and '90s, including Jonylon, Plastex and Regent Chemicals in the UK and Chem Polymers in the USA. It split from BIP in March 2003 when Parndon Properties, one of the private equity investors involved in the 1995 BIP buy-in from Turner & Newall, took control of BIP and other institutional investors including Advent International and Candover retained ownership of Chem Polymer. The company produces reinforced, filled, and specially modified compounds of nylon 6 and 66, acetal, PBT, and PET at two plants in the UK (the former BIP plant at Oldbury and the Plastex plant at Cinderford) and the former Chem Polymers plant at Fort Myers, Florida in the USA. Total annual capacity is 30,000 tonnes.
Teknor Apex, which apart from its vinyl and TPE specialities also makes engineering plastics compounds, is a privately held company with eight divisions and 2,000 employees. It has 10 manufacturing sites across the USA, and a compounding plant in Singapore run by its Singapore Polymer Corp subsidiary.
Chem Polymer will operate under its existing management within Teknor Apex, retaining the Chem Polymer name and its workforce of 150.
Date set for Lanxess share trading to start January 3, 2005
Bayer and Lanxess have set the date for trading in Lanxess shares. They intend for the spin-off to be entered into the commercial register for Bayer AG on January 28, and trading on the Frankfurt stock market could then begin on January 31. Bayer shareholders will be granted one Lanxess share for each 10 Bayer shares they hold when the spin-off is entered into the commercial register.
Packaging and materials organisations to merge January 3, 2005
The Institute of Packaging is planning to merge with the Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining to increase its resources to meet five objectives: to gain critical mass and achieve financial security; to enhance the professional status of members and expand their benefits and services; to increasingly influence the broad development of packaging for the public benefit; to consolidate the activities of the Packaging Industry Awarding Body Company (PIABC); and to heighten the strategic profile of packaging and gain a stronger voice in representations with Government and other interested parties. There will be an extraordinary general meeting of members on January 24 to seek support for the merger.
The IoM³ was formed in 2002 with the merger between the Institute of Materials and the Institution of Mining and Metallurgy. It has 15 technical divisions representing the interests of members, including one that focuses on packaging. But to enhance the role of packaging within the merged Institute, IoP - The Packaging Society will be created as a means of continuing the awards structure, education and training and other functions of the Institute of Packaging.
BP tightens linear alpha olefin production ahead of sell-off January 3, 2005
BP is to halve its production of linear alpha olefins - a market sector in global over capacity - by shutting its Pasadena plant in Texas, USA by the end of the year. The Linear Alpha Olefins business is part of the package of olefins and derivatives businesses which is to be floated publicly by the end of this year.
The Pasadena plant is the oldest of BP's three LAO plants - the other two are at Joffre in Alberta, Canada (250,000 tonnes) and Feluy in Belgium (300,000 tonnes).
The start up of the Joffre plant took BP to 1·05 tonnes capacity in 2001 and expansions by BP and other producers during the last few years have added more than 450,000 tonnes, resulting in an industry overcapacity. Along with the overcapacity the LAO industry has faced slow growth in demand, and high feedstock and energy costs. BP says that closing the Pasadena site will keep the remaining two plants competitive.
BP also operates a polyalpha olefin plant in Deer Park, near the Pasadena site. Operations at this unit are not affected by the closure of the LAO unit.
Indian Oil to enter petrochemicals with PP plant January 3, 2005
Indian Oil Corporation - the world's 19th largest petroleum company - is to enter the polyolefins business with the building of a 600,000 tonnes polypropylene plant. It has plans for an integrated hydrocarbon products business, using its own feedstocks and other existing infrastructure, and intends to expand in petrochemicals.
The PP plant, to be built at Panipat in India, is scheduled to start up in 2007. It will use Basell's Spheripol technology.
New structure for Clariant masterbatch businesses January 3, 2005
Clariant is reorganising its global masterbatch operations into regional businesses comprising market-focused units concentrating on five end-user industries. Each regional business unit will have responsibility for local sales, marketing, and production and technology with the intention of getting new products to market faster and more cost effectively.
Europe has been split into three regional business units: Europe North, which encompasses Germany, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Scandinavia, Finland, Switzerland and Austria and will be managed from Lahnstein in Germany; Europe South and Special Markets, including Italy, the Near Middle East, India, Pakistan, Turkey and South Africa; and Europe West, including Spain, Portugal, France and Benelux.
Solvay plans sulphone expansion January 3, 2005
Solvay's US-based Solvay Advanced Polymers engineering plastics business is to triple its capacity for polyethersulphone with a $50 million+ plant due to start up in 2006. The plant - whose location has not been disclosed - will make the full range of Radel products, which were acquired from BP Amoco in 2000 in exchange for Solvay's PP business.
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