Japan's Chiyoda bags deal to build Malaysian silicon plant

TOKYO (ICIS)--Japan's engineering firm Chiyoda Corp said on Wednesday it has secured a deal to build a 6,000 tonnes/year polycrystalline silicon plant for solar cells in Malaysia, for chemical producer Tokuyama Corp.

The amount of the engineering, procurement and construction contract was not disclosed.

Construction of the plant in Samalaju in Sarawak state would begin next year, with the plant start-up slated in 2013, Chiyoda said in a statement.

In August 2010, Tokuyama had estimated the cost of building the plant, along with related utility facilities and infrastructure, at yen (Y) 80bn ($961m).

MRC

(BASF) -- Soluplus, the polymeric solubilizer from BASF, presented for the first time in 2009 as an innovative excipient, has now won the Silver Innovation Award at CPhI worldwide, the Convention on Pharmaceutical Ingredients and Intermediates. As a matrix polymer, the Solid Solution forms solid solutions with poorly soluble active ingredients and enhances their bioavailability.

BASF's Soluplus helps customers in the pharmaceutical industry develop and produce innovative drug products containing active ingredients that could not have been formulated with conventional excipients. Soluplus is especially designed for pharmaceuticals produced by hot melt extrusion. The technology is becoming increasingly important because it is suitable for formulating novel drug substances, which are in many cases barely soluble and poorly absorbed from the gastrointestinal tract.

MRC

(Plasticstoday) -- Strategic Polymer Sciences Inc. (SPS) has received a $1 million grant from the U.S. Dept. of Energy (DOE) to advance the development of its high-performance energy-storage DC bus-film capacitors, using SPS' proprietary high-temperature electroactive polymer (EAP) compositions. Considered a key component in the power management electronics of hybrid and plug-in electric drive vehicles, the current commercial polypropylene (PP) film DC capacitors cannot reliably operate above 105 C, according to SPS. Since EDV engine radiator coolant temperature can go up to 125 C, a secondary cooling system is required, but with SPS EAP film, which are extruded from proprietary blends of oriented fluoropolymers, the temperature stability is greater than 140 C.
According to industry projections, the market for DC bus film capacitors for hybrid and electric drive vehicle power inverters is forecast to be more than $1.6 billion by 2015.

MRC

(SABIC) -- At the annual meeting of the European Petrochemical Association (EPCA) in Budapest, SABIC, a global leader in the chemicals and plastics industries, yesterday signed a long-term contract with Oiltanking Stolthaven Antwerp NV for storage services. The agreement, which will go into effect in 2013, will ensure an uninterrupted supply of feedstocks to SABIC's two major naptha cracking facilities in Geleen, The Netherlands. Oiltanking Stolthaven Antwerp, based in Belgium, will provide state-of-the-art storage with zero-emission tanks that exceeds Belgian environmental regulations, helping SABIC to ensure a sustainable supply chain. Next to that, a new jetty will be constructed facilitating insuring a very reliable service, as per SABIC press release. This long-term partnership underscores SABIC's strong commitment to its worldwide customers and service providers as well as to its production facilities at the Geleen site in the southern part of the Netherlands.

Oiltanking Stolthaven Antwerp is a joint venture between Oiltanking GmbH and Stolthaven Terminals B.V. operating an independent terminal in Antwerp handling petroleum products, chemicals and gases.

MRC

(BNAmericas) -- Brazilian petrochemical company Braskem has received proposals from four foreign companies, from the Americas, Asia and Europe, to install a sugarcane-based ethylene facility overseas, Braskem CEO Bernardo Gradin told at Triunfo petrochemical hub in Rio Grande do Sul state, where the company recently began producing "green" polyethylene (PE).

"We have received four invitations from different countries to implement the same project, which could even use Brazilian ethanol," Gradin said.

Braskem inaugurated a facility on September 24 that produces 200,000t/y of "green" ethylene, which in turn is fed into the company's PE units to generate the same quantity of the bio-resin.

The exact location of a new "green" ethylene facility is still being evaluated. Though Braskem's main ethanol suppliers are located in the southeast, installing a plant in this region could be more expensive, Gradin said.

The company plans to announce a new "green" PE project through the end of the year.

MRC