Costs basic chemicals

Energy needed for pumping can be a significant cost item for the inexpensive basic chemicals therefore, pressure drop must be known more accurately than calculation methods can provide. The needed accuracy can be achieved only by measuring pressure drop versus flow for every new catalyst. This measurement can now be done much better and more easily than before. Even so, for a basic understanding of correlation between pressure drop and flow, some published work must be consulted. (See Figure 1.4.1 on the next page.)... 

Quick scan survey of the industrial processes at plant level to get an initial overview of the processes and technologies used as well as a collection of basic data, e.g. amount of chemicals used, cost of chemicals purchased, number of pieces or other indications that might be used as unit of payment2 in the Chemical Leasing contract. 

At a minimum, the modeling capability must encompass industry models to reflect the nation s heavy industry at the core of the fossil energy and materials sector (electric power, petroleum refining, basic chemicals). This industry core generates the nation s electricity, refines the nation s petroleum products, and transforms the nation s chemicals into useable endproducts. New trends in production costs, resource use, and environmental quality will generally be influenced significantly by what happens in this heavy industrial core. 

The protocol developed by Holm et al. (1986) was evaluated by analysis of starch content in wheat starch, white wheat flour, whole-grain wheat, and industrially processed wheat products. The major advantage of this protocol over the Basic Protocol is its reduced cost. The chemicals for the reagent preparations and the enzymes are purchased directly from the companies that produce them. The original method did not include RS3 (resistant starch) in its quantitation. A DMSO treatment step has been added (step 4) to solve this problem. 

Chemical producers have witnessed a dramatic run-up in their feedstock prices in the last four years, whether natural gas, crude oil derivatives such as naphtha, or petrochemicals such as benzene. The US chemical industry s feedstock bill in 2004, for example, was up USD 31 billion compared with 2002, representing a 57 percent increase in the net sales value of these basic chemicals. This dramatic overall surge conceals a number of different drivers, each with its own dynamics (Fig. 16.1). Basic hydrocarbon costs were up 72 percent, led by crude oil and nat-... 

Fig. 16.1 The large increases in basic chemicals costs and prices were due to a few very big factors.

Worldwide, in 1987 through 1989 the industry, whether in specialties or in basic chemicals, has certainly had its most prosperous years ever. The chemical industry, on the whole, does not, however, enjoy a very favorable image in the eyes of the public. The harmful spillovers caused by untoward accidents are given wider publicity by the media than the benefits the industry provides. In consequence, administrations that were anxious to soothe the more or less justified fears of their citizens have brought out a spate of regulations often more restraining and therefore more costly than is really necessary. 

In transferring the cost of chemical A to the inventory and cost-of-sales accounts, there is a question as to what price applies for chemical A. There are three basic methods for handling problems of this type. 

Piping is a major item in the cost of chemical process plants. These costs in a fluid-process plant can run as high as 80 percent of the purchased equipment cost or 20 percent of the fixed-capital investment. There are essentially two basic methods for preparing piping-cost estimates-the percentage of installed equipment method and the material and labor take-off method. Several variations of each method have appeared in the literature. 

Subsequently, indigo was successfully produced via fermentation on the 300000 L scale at a cost that was comparable with the price of chemical indigo [109]. Commercialization proved elusive, however, presumably because chemical indigo is marketed with a substantial profit margin. We note that it is common experience that the total costs of a new process, to compete, must be equal to (or lower than) the production cost of the existing process. In this particular case, it would seem that the STY of the fermentative process is too low to compete with a chemical procedure that encompasses only three steps from the basic chemicals aniline and acetic acid. 

Superior cost management has been a key success factor in the more commoditized chemical segments such as polyolefines and basic chemicals (e.g., methanol) for some time now, and this shows through in strong productivity improvements. 

The selectivity of activated carbons for adsorption and catalysis is dependent upon their surface chemistry, as well as upon their pore size distribution. Normally, the adsorptive surface of activated carbons is approximately neutral, such that polar and ionic species are less readily adsorbed than organic molecules. For many applications it would be advantageous to be able to tailor the surface chemistry of activated carbons in order to improve their effectiveness. The approaches that have been taken to modify the type and distribution of surface functional groups have mostly involved the posttreatment of activated carbons or modification of the precursor composition, although the synthesis route and conditions can also be employed to control the properties of the end product. Posttreatment methods include heating in a controlled atmosphere and chemical reaction in the liquid or vapor phase. It has been shown that through appropriate chemical reaction, the surface can be rendered more acidic, basic, polar, or completely neutral [11]. However, chemical treatment can add considerably to the product cost. The chemical composition of the precursor also influences the surface chemistry and offers a potentially lower cost method for adjusting the properties of activated... 

It is clear that a large number of economic factors are influencing the total manufacturing costs of such fine chemicals . Very important ones are the cost of the ligand precursor, the number of process steps, the overall yields, the purification requirements, and the air and moisture sensitivity of the final product. Less important to nearly negligible are the costs of standard raw materials such as solvents and basic chemicals, production scale and analytics [6]. 

Three basic principles have emerged as common themes in these policies the Polluter Pays Principle clarifies who bears the costs for chemical contamination the Substitution Principle encourages the adoption of the safest chemicals and the Precautionary Principle promotes preventive action even in the face of the uncertainties of risks (see Section 3.3.2 for a more in depth discussion of the Precautionary Principle). Specifically, the new national chemicals policies of Northern European countries have relied on rapid screening tests for determining regulatory actions on chemicals, focused on products and product lifecycles for risk reduction, established lists of undesirable substances, and, in limited cases, employed government authority to phase out the use of the most hazardous substances such as lead, mercury, cadmium, brominated flame retardants and chlorinated paraffins (for a more extensive review, see Tickner and Geiser, 2003, www.chemicalspolicy.org). 

The chemistry of synthetic jasmine materials was given an enormous boost in the 1930s when Nylon 66 was launched as a product. Nylon 66 is a polyamide prepared using adipoyl chloride and hexamethylenetetramine as monomers. The 66 in the name refers to the fact that there are 6 carbons in each type of unit that lies between the amide links in the polymer chain. Thus, adipic acid is the key feedstock for Nylon 66 and the introduction of the latter meant that the former became a basic chemical commodity. Pyrolysis of the calcium or barium salt of adipic acid produces cyclopentanone, and so the availability of large quantities of the acid meant that the ketone could also be prepared at low cost. 

Typically, it can be assumed that the market value of (basic) chemicals increases with passing more processing steps. Hence, stock holding costs increase, too. The net demand rates provided in tons per day for Naphtha, Pygas, and Benzene under normal processing conditions can be found in Table 3.9 accompanied by stock holding cost rates in per ton... 

However, transport capacities of ships and barges are generally larger than train capacities. Hence, transport cost rates per volume and distance unit are typically higher for rail transports. Since most large-scaled chemical production sites have waterway access, raw materials are typically supphed via ship transports, but intermediate and minor basic chemicals are often transported via rail e.g. because the distribution structure is disperse and/or not all customers/suppliers have waterway access. 

Ship transportation is one of the most attractive transport modes for raw chemical procurement in chemical industry. Raw materials and basic chemicals are required constantly and in huge quantities to supply continuously operating chemical production plants. The ideal transport mode is the pipeline transport. However, pipehnes dedicated for basic and raw chemicals are seldom available due to large distances to bridge, high investment costs, and the inflexibility of sourcing. In most cases, raw and basic chemicals are transported by ships if a sea or river port is available. 

An important part of external uncertainty is caused by customer demands. However, in basic chemical industry almost all final chemicals are produced to stock and, thus, are decoupled from direct market demands. Hence, variations of the customer demand do not affect the upstream production network immediately. Due to the exceptionally high re-start and changeover costs for plants, demand variations are mostly reflected by stock increases or sales price declines. The adaptation of production capacities by means... 

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