US Baystar will have first new plant dedicated to Borealis tech

HOUSTON (ICIS)–The new high-density polyethylene (HDPE) plant that the Bayport Polymers (Baystar) joint venture is building in the US will be the first commercial-scale unit dedicated to Borealis’s third-generation Borstar technology, the CEO of the company said on Thursday.

Two other plants are using the process technology, but one is a pilot plant and the other is a retrofit, said Alfred Stern, CEO of Borealis, one of the joint-venture partners. The new plant will be larger than either of these two, and it will be the first of its kind in North America.

As such, the Bayport Polymers plant will be the first one to be built specifically to accommodate the third-generation Borstar technology, Stern said.

The 625,000 tonne/year plant is in Pasadena, Texas, and it should start up in 2021.

Stern expects the new Borstar technology will help polymer stand out against material from the other new PE plants. Like the Bayport plant, these new units will feature the latest process technologies.

The third-generation Borstar technology is multi-modal, allowing it to produce PE that incorporates the best features of different grades.

Bayport will target the plant’s output to the packaging, pipe and infrastructure, and wire and cable end markets, Stern said.

NOVA Chemicals, another joint-venture partner, will oversee the marketing of the Borstar resins. NOVA already has several plants in Canada, making it ideal to market material from the new Bayport site in Texas.

NOVA and Borealis are connected via Mubadala, an investment company based in Abu Dhabi that owns all of NOVA and 64% of Borealis (OMV owns the remaining stake).

The other partner in the Bayport joint venture, Total, has contributed two existing HDPE lines to Bayport. These have a total capacity of 400,000 tonnes/year.

These two lines and the new PE plant will be fed by a new ethane cracker being built by the joint venture. It broke ground in mid-2018 and is 50% completed. The cracker should start up in 2020.

Together, the cracker and new PE plant represent a $3bn investment.

Bayport is a 50/50 joint venture made up of Total Petrochemicals & Refining USA and Novealis.

Novealis itself is a joint venture made up of Borealis and NOVA Chemicals.

The image above shows a groundbreaking ceremony held at the site of the new Bayport PE plant. Photo by Al Greenwood

Additional reporting by Zachary Moore and Tracy Dang