New Plant Capacity

Many companies have expanded their capacity for additive production over the past four years. Much of the new plant has been located outside Europe and North America, with a big increase in Asian capacity. The following examples should be read in conjunction with Table 6.15. 

Akcros Chemicals has increased its production of Interlite ZP solid mixed metal soap stabilisers, mostly calcium/zinc based, at its Eccles, Manchester (UK) site. They are for use in sensitive applications such as medical devices and food packaging. The company has withdrawn from making lead stabihsers. 

The leading Emopean manufacturer of PVC profiles, H T Troplast, is now making its own calcium-zinc PVC stabilisers in a 7,000 t plant at Pirmasens near Sarbrucken. They will be used both in Emope and in the company s US facilities. 

Vocco (Volgograd Chemical Co.) has set up a small pilot plant to manufacture up to 200 tonnes/y of Firestop (UK) s Nofian nonbrominated flame-retardant at its Volgograd site. Firestop s parent is Flintstone Technologies. 

Rohm and Haas has closed its Semoy (France) factory for making methyl tin stabilisers, and is relying on its Cincinnati, US plant. 

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Since 1980 high-activity modified ZSM-5 catalysts that operate at 450°C and 20 atm have been used in most new plants. Capacities of up to 800,000 toimes/year have been possible. The catalyst is extremely active and forms few by-products or coke-forming polymers. Capital costs for equipment are lower and the use of highly corrosive catalysts is avoided. 

Year Polyethylene (million tones year" ) Polypropylene (million tones year ) Typical new plant capacity (tones year" )... 

Worldwide furfuryl alcohol capacity in 1993 was estimated to be 110,000 metric tons (38). As with furfural, new capacity in developing countries is replacing older capacity in developed countries. China and South Africa have become significant producers of furfuryl alcohol. New plants have been built in Asia and Indonesia as well. Consumption of furfuryl alcohol is spread over the globe the largest use is in the foundry industry which is increasingly moving away from heavily industrialized countries. 

World Capacity, Production, and Consumption. Current and future world capacity, based on aimounced new plants and expansions, and 1987 production and consumption data are shown in Table 7 (38). Consumption of acetone is expected to grow at a rate of about 2% aimually until... 

Current and projected future capacity based on aimounced new plants and expansions. 

In 1989 chlorine was produced by 25 companies at 52 locations in the United States (Table 4). Approximately half of these plants are located in the Southeast (Eig. 2). Two companies, Dow Chemical USA and Occidental Chemical Corporation, accounted for 54.3% of the total operating capacity the top five companies accounted for 77.5%. Although 0.8 million tons per year of chlorine capacity is presendy idle (Table 4), announced expansions are expected to bring an additional 660,000 t of new chlorine capacity onstream by 1992, increasing total capacity by about 6%/yr (Table 5). 

The price differential at which coal becomes competitive with gas depends on plant size and the cost of capital, but based on estimates by the International Energy Agency (21) the required price ratio for gas to coal in North America falls into the range of 3.1 to 3.7 on an equivalent energy basis ( /MJ). Current prices give a gas/coal cost ratio nearer 1.5 to 2.0. As a result, all projected new methanol capacity is based on natural gas or heavy oil except for the proposed coal-based plant in China. 

Because an excess of ammonia is fed to the reactor, and because the reactions ate reversible, ammonia and carbon dioxide exit the reactor along with the carbamate and urea. Several process variations have been developed to deal with the efficiency of the conversion and with serious corrosion problems. The three main types of ammonia handling ate once through, partial recycle, and total recycle. Urea plants having capacity up to 1800 t/d ate available. Most advances have dealt with reduction of energy requirements in the total recycle process. The economics of urea production ate most strongly influenced by the cost of the taw material ammonia. When the ammonia cost is representative of production cost in a new plant it can amount to more than 50% of urea cost. 

New plant constmction will bring iacreased capacity to a level which will depend on real growth to keep sales abreast with production. It is anticipated that consoHdation of ownership will continue and that the trend to specialized busiaesses supporting a plant faciUty will also continue. Pressures from environmental issues could change the cost of final products as well as mandate the use of post-consumer waste resia as feedstock for production. 

Production, Storage, and Shipment. All U.S. producers have at least a 75,000-t aimual capacity. There are some small plants and small producers in Europe with less than 20,000-t capacity. These are gradually being shut down, and any new plant would have to be large in order to reach economies of scale in the present market (ca 1995), which is highly competitive. 

Production, Storage, and Shipment. A plant of 50,000-t annual capacity could be considered viable for production of isophthahc acid, although no new plants have been constmcted since the early 1980s. Storage of isophthahc acid is in silos. Shipment is in 22.7- and 25-kg bags, 0.5-t and 1-t bags, or hopper tmcks. The far lower production quantity of isophthahc acid and its more varied apphcations vs terephthahc acid mean that high volume... 

These reductions in capacity, coupled with the growth in aniline demand led to shortages in aniline supply in 1987 and 1988. The shortage is expected to persist into the early 1990s until new capacity comes on stream. Mobay and BASF have aimounced plans to build new plants (113,000 and 54,000 t, respectively), which are to start in 1992. 

Nuclear Reactors. Nuclear power faciUties account for about 20% of the power generated in the United States. Although no new plants are plaimed in the United States, many other countries, particularly those that would otherwise rely heavily on imported fuel, continue to increase their nuclear plant generation capacity. Many industry observers predict that nuclear power may become more attractive in future years as the price of fossil fuels continues to rise and environmental regulations become more stringent. In addition, advanced passive-safety reactor designs may help allay concerns over potential safety issues. 

The only new sihcon capacity since the early 1990s is by the Gulf Ferroalloys Company in Saudi Arabia. This plant is expected to have four furnaces and produce silicon metal, ferrosihcon, sihcomanganese, and manganese alloys by late 1996. 

In 1994, there were approximately six to seven dozen companies producing shicon in about 30 different Western countries, together employing several hundred furnaces. Nameplate Western world ferrosihcon capacity was estimated at 1,830,000 t of contained shicon. The effective capacity in 1994 was estimated at 1,450,000 t of contained shicon. There has been a definite shift in ferrosihcon capacity and trends for new plants and expansions are outside of the traditional supply areas. Since 1992, new capacity has been added in South Africa, Venezuela, Iran, and Bhutan. Additional plants near completion in Iran and Saudi Arabia are scheduled to start in 1996. The Western world ferrosihcon supply is expected to increase by about 150,000 t/yr of contained shicon by the year 2000 (27). 

Although benzene prices have escalated in recent years, a concurrent need for butenes for use in alkylates for motor fuel has also increased and butane prices have also escalated. As a result, a search for alternative feedstocks began and Amoco Chemical Co. commercialized a process in 1977 to produce maleic anhydride from butane. A plant in JoHet came on-stream in 1977 with a capacity of 27,000 t/yr (135,136). No new plants have been built in the United States based on butenes since the commercialization of butane to maleic anhydride technology. In Europe and particularly in Japan, however, where butane is in short supply and needs for butenes as alkylation feed are also much less, butenes may become the dominant feedstock (see Maleic anhydride). 

Estimated worldwide aimual caprolactam production capacities are shown in Table 3. New plant constmction is plaimed in Korea, Taiwan, India, China, and Indonesia. Total new capacity over the next 10 years could exceed 500,000 tons per year. 

In addition to environmental and safety factors, some of the early decline in manufacture was hastened by a series of plant shutdowns between 1971 and 1973 resulting primarily from the high costs of the acetylene-based process. No new production capacity is planned in the United States for the foreseeable future. 

Plant capacities for the production of benzyl chloride in the western world totaled 144,200 t/yr in 1989. Monsanto, with plants in Belgium (23,000 t/yr) and Bridgeport, New Jersey (40,000 t/yr) is the largest producer. Bayer in West Germany (20,000 t/yr) and Tessendedo Chemie in Belgium (18,000 t/yr) are also principal producers. 

The Fossil Power Plants of the 1990s and into the early part of the new millennium will be the Combined Cycle Power Plants, with the gas turbine as being the centerpiece of the plant. It is estimated that between 1997-2006 there will be an addition of 147.7 GW of power. These plants have replaced the large Steam Turbine Plants, which were the main fossil power plants through the 1980s. The Combined Cycle Power Plant is not new in concept, since some have been in operation since the midl950s. These plants came into their own with the new high capacity and efficiency gas turbines. 

An alternative to a factored estimate, in some cases, can be a scaled estimate if the battery limits cost of a similar plant is known, but the size is different. The cost of the new plant, C , is equal to the known plant cost, C, times the ratio of the two plants capacity raised to a fractional power. That is ... 

Increased Plant Capacity - When an existing plant capacity is increased, the entire pressure relieving system should be reevaluated, even though new equipment has been added. For example, a unit operating at 120 % of design capacity may require additional pressure relieving capacity. 

In the future, if the criterion for selecting new generating capacity was solely fuel cost, coal will be the number one choice. But the much greater costs of coal-fired plants (primarily to meet local and federal emission standards), as well as the potential of tighter standards, will make gas more attractive in many cases. And although natural gas prices may rise, the fuel costs per kilowatt-hour for gas-fired power plants should remain unchanged as efficiency gains offset the rise in fuel prices. 

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