Chemical commodity production

Fuels. Two-thirds of the fuel used by the United States chemical industry in 1988 was natural gas [8006-14-2] which is clean and easy to combust (see Gas, natural). Although relatively inexpensive at the wellhead, natural gas is cosdy to transport. Hence the chemical industry is concentrated in regions where natural gas is produced, keeping the average price paid by the U.S. chemical industry for natural gas in 1988 to only 80% of the average U.S. industrial price (1). Similarly the movement of chemical commodity production to the Middle East is driven by the desire to obtain low cost natural gas. 

Production Planning detailing the planning requirements for a chemical commodity production with continuous and multi-purpose resources... 

Specialty chemicals, however, differ in that they are used for thek performance properties and usuaHy are not specified chemical entities. Products from different suppHers usuaHy differ somewhat, and free interchangabHity is not always possible. Special chemical systems also exist in the market and these are formulated products that contain both commodity and specialty chemicals. 

Commercial production of PE resias with densities of 0.925 and 0.935 g/cm was started ia 1968 ia the United States by Phillips Petroleum Co. Over time, these resias, particularly LLDPE, became large volume commodity products. Their combiaed worldwide productioa ia 1994 reached 13 X 10 metric t/yr, accouatiag for some 30% market share of all PE resias ia the year 2000, LLDPE productioa is expected to iacrease by 50%. A aew type of LLDPE, compositioaaHy uniform ethylene—a-olefin copolymers produced with metallocene catalysts, was first introduced by Exxon Chemical Company in 1990. The initial production volume was 13,500 t/yr but its growth has been rapid indeed, in 1995 its combiaed production by several companies exceeded 800,000 tons. 

Dicyclohexylamine (DCHA), C6HuNHC6Hn, MW = 181.3. Sp. gr = 0.914. Flash point = 219 °F (ASTM D56/closed cup). Available as strongly basic, secondary amine, 99+% commodity product, from manufacturers such as Monsanto Chemical Company and Abbott Laboratories, Inc. 

Diethanolamine (DEA), 2,2 -iminodiethanol di( -ethyloxy)aniline. HN-(CH2CH2OH)2, MW = 105.1. Sp. gr. = 1.097. Flash point = 280 °F. Also used as an absorbent for acidic gases in petrochemical operations. Hygroscopic. Available as a 98.5+% alkyl amine commodity product from various international manufacturers, including Texaco Corporation. Commonly available through chemical distributors. 

Dimethylaminoethanol (DMAE), also known as N,N-dimethylethanolamine (DMEA) HOCH2CH2N(CH3)2 MW = 89.1. Sp.gr. = 0.887. Flash point = 105 °F/40 °C. Available as a 98.5+% amine commodity product from various international manufacturers and commonly available through chemical distributors. 

With the renaissance in alkene chemistry engendered by the rising versatility of olefin metathesis in both fine chemical and commodity production, new methods for alkene isomerization are of increasing interest and importance. Alkene isomerization can be performed using Bronsted-Lowry acid or base catalysis (1). However, these reactions are limited to substrates which tolerate carbanionic or carbocation intermediates, and are susceptible to undesired side reactions. 

Vitamin E, being first reported barely a century ago, is the biologically most important fat-soluble antioxidant and has become a commodity product and bulk chemical in the meantime. Besides its antioxidant function, several nonantioxidant actions of the compound have been recently identified and new ones are still being discovered.1... 

Chemical products can be divided into three broad classes commodity, fine and specialty chemicals. Commodity chemicals are manufactured in large volumes with low added value. Fine and specialty chemicals tend to be manufactured in low volumes with high added value. The priorities in the design of processes for the manufacture of the three classes of chemical products will differ. 

This relatively stable system now faces increasing volatility and complexity due to volatile demand and raw material prices as well as globalization in markets and company networks. Specifically, price-volatile commodity products within the chemical industry require planning volumes together with values across sales to procurement. In this context, the work of Matthias Kannegiesser focuses on two research questions ... 

Additional challenges exist specifically for chemical commodities. Commodities are standard products with a defined quality, where price is the key buying criterion. Commodities are often volatile in sales and purchasing prices as well as volumes increasing crude oil prices lead to higher raw material prices in procurement while dynamic customer markets specifically in Asia lead to a sales price and volume volatility. These dynamics in volumes and values through the value chain directly impact company s profitability as shown in fig. 1. 

A key product classification scheme in the chemical industry is the differentiation of specialty and commodity products. Kline (1976) provides a segmentation of the chemical industry into commodities, specialties and fine chemicals shown in fig. 28. 

Production processes for chemical commodities exist often already for decades and are continuously enhanced as shown in the following example from the 1970s. Commodity production processes this time already have been rather complex composed by multiple reactions and interim steps as shown in the following example of Caprolactam production, an intermediate product for Polyamide (Sittig 1972, p. 139) in fig. 35. 

A production location comprises one or multiple production plants where production resources are located. Production resources are single units or groups of production units aggregated to production lines or assets. Having the structure of chemical commodity value chain network as a network of chemical production processes in mind presented in fig. 34 (Al-Sharrah et al. 2001), production locations include respective resources and transportation lanes between production locations to model relations in chemical Verbund structures. 

The product type can be commodity or specialty. Commodity products are considered with a defined standard quality, where price is the key buying criterion. The product life cycle for chemical commodities can be relatively long meaning that the products are in the market partly for decades. Examples for short life cycle commodities on the other hand are semiconductors that are also mainly sold over price, but are shortly out-dated due to technology advances. The number of products is medium and does not reach the complexity of specialty product portfolios, where often more than 1,000 products need to be handled by a company. The product customization is standardized with some variants with respect to product properties but not related to a specific customer. Product perishability is... 

When classifying chemical products, Seider et al. [3] identify three categories (1) basic chemicals (commodity and specialty chemicals, bio-materials, and polymeric materials) (2) industrial chemicals (films, fibers, paper,. ..) and (3) configured consumer products (dialysis devices, post-it notes, transparencies, drug delivery patches,. ..). In the manufacture of epitaxial silicon wafers, a thin film of crystalline silicon is often deposited on a polished crystalline silicon... 

Ethanol in the past has been used commercially to synthesize dozens of other high-volume chemical commodities. However, at present, it has been substituted in many applications by less costly petrochemical feedstocks, e.g., ethylene. The availability of low-cost ethanol and the rising cost of ethylene, however, may change this scenario. For example, there is interest in producing ethylene from ethanol [71-73], while the opposite reaction is commercially current. Already, in markets with abundant agricultural products, but a less developed petrochemical infrastructure, such as the People s Republic of China, Pakistan, India, and Brazil, ethanol can be used to produce chemicals, including ethylene and butadiene, that would be produced from petroleum in the West. For example, ethanol may substitute alkenes for the alkylation of aromatics [82]. 

In view of the use of glycerol as a chemical commodity for the production of chemical intermediates, an overview will be made of existing catalytic knowledge. More specifically, glycerol oxidation, dehydration, hydrogenolysis, oligomerization/polymerization, polyol formation, and formation of a few miscellaneous products will be dealt with. 

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