By John Richardson THE COMPLEXITY of the economic outlook is such that nobody can say with even the smallest degree of genuine confidence what will happen to global petrochemicals and polymers demand over the next five years. It is hard to know where to start in suggesting scenarios of how the interconnections between today’s four […]
Asian Chemical Connections
China PMIs point to export slowdown and risk to petchems market rally
By John Richardson WE STILL DON’T have all the data we need to reach a firm conclusion about whether the recent surge in China’s petrochemical prices (see a few examples above) is founded on genuinely strong demand or just stocking-up by buyers in anticipation of further supply-driven price increases. And even where we do have […]
Making all the stuff the world needs in sustainable ways is our defining challenge
By John Richardson YOU ARE a global petrochemicals producer either headquartered in Europe or with major operations in Europe. Stepping up your recycling game must be part of your strategy because of ever-intensifying EU legislation, including the introduction of an €800/tonne charge on plastic waste from January this year. The charge is paid by each […]
China PX imports could fall by 64% in 2021 with styrene imports 59% lower
By John Richardson AS OF yesterday, around 70% of US paraxylene capacity was offline. No less than 67% of US ethylene capacity and 14% of benzene capacity had been impacted by the severe winter weather, meaning of course that US styrene monomer (SM) output will have also been severely curtailed. I could go on, covering […]
China’s PP imports in 2021 could fall by as much as 53% over last year
By John Richardson TODAY I get closer to completing my outlooks for China’s petrochemical and polymer imports in 2021 by analysing what might happen in polypropylene (PP). Later this week or next week I will complete the picture by looking at styrene monomer. Previously, I examined polyethylene (PE), where this year there is very little […]
China slowdown may be the biggest petchem event in H1, not US and European tight supply
By John Richardson I SUSPECT that the bigger story for the global petrochemicals industry in H1 may not turn out to be the extraordinary production shortages in the US and Europe that are being so well detailed by the ICIS pricing and analytics teams. “Eh, what on earth are you talking about?” you may well […]
Petrochemicals and demand: a deer caught in the headlights
By John Richardson THE THING is, as I discussed in my 9 February blog post, we simply do not have our hands on the data. Unless we improve our access to data, and greatly ramp up our ability to process and analyse the numbers, the petrochemicals industry will remain largely in the dark on demand. […]
Global PP demand to remain resilient in 2021 even if we fail to control the pandemic
By John Richardson THE ABOVE chart, using polypropylene (PP) as an example, neatly crystallises an argument I’ve been making since last August: that the changes in 2020 end-use demand resulting from the pandemic enabled petrochemicals and polymer producers to more than compensate for the overall weakness of economies. Despite the collapse of GDP growth last […]
Why it is obvious few, in any, conventional steam crackers will start-up after 2030
By John Richardson I SAID TO a contact earlier this week that it was remarkable that a senior executive at a petrochemicals company thought few, if any, conventionally built steam crackers would come online after 2030. His response was, “of course, that’s obvious”. But from the perspective of some other industry executives, the future is […]
China paraxylene imports may be just 6.6m tonnes in 2021 – 58% lower than only three years ago
By John Richardson PLEASE DON’T say I didn’t tell you. Further big declines in China’s paraxylene (PX) imports seem likely in. We could also see less dramatic falls in polypropylene (PP) and styrene monomer (SM) imports this year, which I shall detail in later posts. But here a I shall focus on PX. This year’s […]
Jump to page: