Global Market by Application

The global market is estimated to be growing at 3-4% with most growth in Asia (especially China) and some growth in North America. The Western European market is maturing, but Eastern Europe is developing. Much of the growth is due to profile for windows and this increased to over 20% by 2002. 

The supply/demand balance is tightening for EDC/VCM due to capacity limitations caused by poor returns holding back investment. In addition to supplier consolidations, there have been customer based consolidations driving lower net prices. 

An important area for PVC is the water transportation market and there has been competition from polyolefins in this area. The PVC producers have responded by introducing foam core pipe, for improved cost effectiveness. In another development, orientation during processing gives improved impact resistance (195). More details follow in subsequent sections. 

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