Dow Chemical to construct world-scale propylene production facility at Dow Texas Operations

⌠This investment directly supports Dow's transformational strategy to enhance its feedstock flexibility and integration strength, and positions the Company for growth in attractive markets and geographies. Basic engineering work for the new on-purpose propylene production facility at Dow Texas Operations has commenced, and the project is on track for production start-up in 2015.

MRC

(4-traders) -- Indorama Ventures PCL (IVL.TH) said Tuesday it has entered into an agreement with PT Polypet Karyapersada to acquire its polyethylene terephthalate, or PET, resin production facilities in Indonesia.

The integrated polyester chain producer said in a filing to the Stock Exchange of Thailand that the facilities have a production capacity of 100,800 tons per year.

Indorama Ventures said the assets it is acquiring are located adjacent to its joint venture, PT Indorama Petrochemicals, and will help in expanding its presence in the Indonesian PET market, without elaborating on the deal value.

The acquisition, which is subject to approval from local authorities, is expected to be completed in this quarter, Indorama Ventures added.

Indorama Ventures is one of the world's largest producers of PET, a product used by bottlers and textile manufacturers.

MRC

(styron) -- Styron Europe GmbH and its affiliate companies in Europe announced today price increases for all polystyrene and copolymers grades.

Effective immediately, or as existing contract terms allow, the prices for the products listed below will increase as follows: STYRON general purpose polystyrene grades (GPPS) by Euro 40 per metric ton, STYRON and STYRON A-TECH high impact polystyrene grades (HIPS) by 80 Euro per metric ton, MAGNUM ABS resins by 100 Euro per metric ton, TYRIL SAN resin by 45 Euro per metric ton.

In addition to keeping pace with the continuous escalation in all raw material costs associated with the manufacturing of these products since the beginning of the year, this price increase seeks to restore adequate operating margins so that Styron can meet the ongoing needs of its customers in Europe.

MRC

(hydrocarbonprocessing) -- A major oil pipeline will be shut down for several days after a spill and fire near Chicago caused by a freak car accident. The pipeline was shut down within hours of the accident early Saturday morning and will remain shut down until Thursday morning, an Enbridge spokeswoman said.

A Chevrolet SUV and a Ford Mustang crashed into each other and hit a small above-ground section of an Enbridge oil pipeline in an industrial park in New Lenox, Ill., causing a spill and fire that killed two people and injured three.

The pipeline was shut down within hours of the accident early Saturday morning and will remain shut down until Thursday morning, an Enbridge spokeswoman said.

The outage could worsen an already constrained oil distribution system between Canada and the U.S. and send the prices for Canadian oil lower. Canada's access to buyers in the US has been limited as storage and refining space in the Midwest has been filled by surging production in Canada and the western US.

The downed Enbridge Line 14/64 pipeline normally transports 317,000 bpd of oil along Enbridge's Lakehead System, which is the largest crude oil pipeline to the US from the US's largest supplier, Canada.

Line 14/64 connects oil storage in Superior, Wis., to refiners near Griffith, Ind. Enbridge's Line 6A, which transports 670,000 bpd of oil, also runs between Superior and Griffith, and will be operational. Line 14 will be restarted Wednesday evening and Line 14 Thursday morning, the Enbridge spokeswoman said.
MRC

MOSCOW (MRC) -- Russian producers increased the quotation of polystyrene (PS) by rouble (Rb) 1,000-2,000/tonne fro March deliveries, according to MRC analysts. From the year start, there has been a stable demand from converters in the Russian market of PS. In January the market players fulfilled their inventories as required while in February the fears appeared as for a probable serious price hike following the European producers. Converters made additional inventories.

In the European market PS price had grown twice - in January and February hat was caused by the growth of feedstock. Over the two months, the European producers' price quotation for PS
grew by EUR160-200/tonne.

Within January-February 2012, Russian producers kept the price quotation at the level of the end of 2011 with insignificant changes. As of late February 2012, the price for Nizhnekamsk GPPS made Rb64,000-66,000/tonne, VAT included, СРТ Моscow, and the price for HIPS was within Rb67,000-68,000/tonne.

The price for March deliveries of Nizhnekamsk PS grew on average by Rb2,000/tonne, as a result GPPS price reached Rb66,000-68,000/tonne, and HIPS price made Rb69,000-71,000/tonne, VAT included, СРТ Моscow.

The price quotation for PS produced by Gazprom neftekhim Salavat grew on average by Rb1,000/tonne: GPPS is offered for Rb61,500-62,000/tonne, VAT included, СРТ Моscow, natural HIPS is traded for Rb62,000-63,000/tonne, VAT included, СРТ Моscow.

PGProf set the price quotation fro GPPS starting from Rb66,000/tonne, FCA Кirishi. The offer of the material in spot is still low, since the main volumes of the material are processed at Penoplex.

MRC