Chevron and USW to discuss possible end to strike at California oil refinery

MRC) -- Negotiators from Chevron Corp and the United Steelworkers union (USW) are scheduled to meet to discuss a possible end to a strike at the company’s oil refinery in Richmond, California, reported Reuters with reference to spokes people from both sides.

The talks will be the first face-to-face meeting in nearly two weeks between Chevron and USW Local 12-5. Some 500 workers at the 245,271 bpd refinery formally began the strike on March 21 after the two sides failed to reach agreement on a new labor contract.

As MRC reported earlier, Chevron plans to begin an overhaul of the crude distillation unit (CDU) at its 245,271-bpd Richmond, California, refinery in mid-April, 2022. Chevron spokesman Tyler Kruzich declined to comment on day-to-day operations. Chevron will shut the 240,000-bpd CDU for the overhaul. The CDU breaks down crude oil into hydrocarbon feedstocks for all other units at the refinery.

We remind that Chevron Phillips Chemical, a joint venture of Phillips 66 and Chevron, will make a final investment decision on a new cracker in far southeast Texas in 2022, followed by an FID in 2023 on an USD8 billion joint venture petrochemical complex along the US Gulf Coast in 2023.

Ethylene and propylene are the main feedstocks for the production of polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP), respectively.

According to MRC's ScanPlast report, Russia's estimated PE consumption totalled 2,487,450 tonnes in 2021, up by 13% year on year. Shipments of all grades of ethylene polymers increased. At the same time, PP shipments to the Russian market totalled 1,494.280 tonnes, up by 21% year on year. Deliveries of homopolymer PP and PP block copolymers increased, whreas.shipments of PP random copolymers decreased significantly.

Headquartered in San Ramon, California, Chevron Corporation is the the second-largest integrated energy company in the United States and among the largest corporations in the world. Chevron is involved in upstream activities including exploration and production, downstream activities including refining, marketing and transportation, and advanced energy technology. Chevron is also invested in power generation and gasification processes.
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Versalis S.p.A. (San Donato Milanese), Eni’s chemical company, has agreed to license its proprietary continuous mass technology to Shandong Eco Chemical Co. Ltd, a Chinese company part of Shandong Haike Holding Ltd., said Chemengonline.

The license will be granted for a 210,000-ton/yr acrylonitrile butadiene styrene (ABS) unit to be built in Dongying, Shandong province (China).

This is a state-of-the-art technology for the production of styrenic polymers, set to be licensed in China for the first time, with a low-carbon footprint achieved via strong reductions across emissions and energy consumption. Applications encompass the automotive industry, household appliances, electronics, medical appliances and furniture.

The license agreement reinforces Versalis’ primacy in the styrenics business and strengthens its position in the Asian market, a region which is undergoing strong expansion in the petrochemical field and is increasingly focused on selecting more sustainable technologies with a low environmental impact.

As per MRC, Versalis, Eni's chemical company, announces that it has begun the production of bioethanol from lignocellulosic biomass at their Crescentino plant. The plant, which was acquired in 2018, has been overhauled thanks to major investments and has started the production of advanced bioethanol, in compliance with the European legislation for the development of renewable energy, as it is derived from raw materials that do not interfere with the food chain. The bioethanol, produced using Proesa technology, is ISCC-EU certified and will be used to formulate gasoline with a renewable component.

As per MRC, Versalis S.p.A. (San Donato Milanese), the chemical company of Italian energy major Eni, has licensed to Enter Engineering Pte. Ltd. a Low-Density Polyethylene/Ethyl Vinyl Acetate (LDPE/EVA) swing unit to be built as part of a new Gas-to-Chemical Complex based on MTO-Methanol to Olefins technology to be located in the Karakul area in the Bukhara region of the Republic of Uzbekistan.

Eni is an Italian multinational oil and gas company headquartered in Rome. It has operations in in 79 countries, and is currently Italy's largest industrial company. The Italian government owns a 30.3% golden share in the company, 3.93% held through the state Treasury and 26.37% held through the Cassa depositi e prestiti. Another 39.40% of the shares are held by BNP Paribas.

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QVC (Qatar Vinyl Company) has been given approval by Industries Qatar (IQ) and Mesaieed Petrochemical Holding (MPHC) to establish a new suspension polyvinyl chloride (S-PVC) facility in Mesaieed Industrial City, said Gulf-times.

The contract value of this project is USD239m. QVC is a joint venture between MPHC with a 55.2% stake, Qatar Petrochemical Company (QAPCO) with a 31.9% stake and QatarEnergy with a 12.9% stake. The proposed capacity of the PVC plant will be 350,000 tonnes. It will be integrated with QVC’s existing facilities, from which it will source the feedstock vinyl chloride monomer (VCM).

The plant will operate sustainably, through the efficient usage water and power and existing logistics facilities. This plant will be the first PVC-producing facility in Qatar and aims to establish Qatar as a regional production hub.

The PVC produced will contribute towards meeting the requirements from the flourishing construction industry in the region, which is one of the biggest consumers of PVC. It also aims to provide an opportunity to export PVC internationally. The largest suspension PVC producer in the Middle East is Saudi Basic Industries Corporation (SABIC). Company officials could not be immediately reached for comment.

Qatar Chemical (Q-Chem), part of Chevron Phillips Chemical Qatar, planned to resume HDPE production in Mesaieed, Qatar in early April after a scheduled overhaul. The company stopped the plant with a capacity of 375,000 tonnes of HDPE per year for maintenance in mid-February.

According to MRC's ScanPlast report, February production of unmixed PVC in Russia exceeded 82,600 tonnes from 87,100 tonnes a month earlier, all Russian producers kept a high level of capacity utilisation. Total PVC production in Russia reached 169,700 tonnes in January - February 2022 against 169,200 tonnes a year earlier, three producers increased the volume of polymer production, and only one reduced output.

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Chevron has announced an agreement to join the Global Centre for Maritime Decarbonization (GCMD), according to Hydrocarbonprocessing.

Chevron’s involvement aims to help support GCMD’s efforts to develop potentially scalable lower carbon technologies – including those that enable the use of ammonia as a maritime fuel – and the commercial means to enable their adoption.

The GCMD is an independent, non-profit organization, established with support from the Maritime and Port Authority of Singapore. It collaborates with the maritime industry, plans to conduct pilot projects and trials, and advocates for well-designed climate policies and standards.

“Shipping is a hard-to-abate sector and to reach the International Maritime Organization's climate goals, collaboration across the value chain is required,” said Professor Lynn Loo, CEO of the Global Centre for Maritime Decarbonization. “We look forward to working with Chevron and capitalizing on its experience as a fuel producer, supplier and end user to operationalize pilots, which we believe will ultimately shorten the time to deployment and adoption of decarbonization solutions. This partnership will enable both organizations to work closely on the fuels of the future as well as carbon capture technologies, both of which are critical enablers expected to help the sector meet its net zero ambitions.”

As part of its pursuit of a lower carbon future, Chevron Shipping is continuing to explore new technologies, energy-saving devices, and lower carbon fuels, and is collaborating with industry organizations on these potential solutions.

In 2021, Chevron launched Chevron New Energies (CNE) to accelerate lower carbon businesses in hydrogen, CCUS, offsets and emerging energy opportunities, as well as support Chevron’s continued focus on renewable fuels and products. As part of its strategy, CNE is focused on customers in sectors of the economy with harder to abate emissions.

“Chevron is leveraging our capabilities, assets and customer relationships to identify opportunities to lower emissions of our own operations, while also identifying ways that essential sectors of the economy, such as the maritime industry, can achieve their lower carbon goals,” said Austin Knight, vice president of Hydrogen for Chevron New Energies. “Alongside Chevron Shipping, we look forward to collaborating with GCMD and its partners on this effort.”

As MRC reported earlier, Chevron plans to begin an overhaul of the crude distillation unit (CDU) at its 245,271-bpd Richmond, California, refinery in mid-April, 2022. Chevron spokesman Tyler Kruzich declined to comment on day-to-day operations. Chevron will shut the 240,000-bpd CDU for the overhaul. The CDU breaks down crude oil into hydrocarbon feedstocks for all other units at the refinery.

We remind that Chevron Phillips Chemical, a joint venture of Phillips 66 and Chevron, will make a final investment decision on a new cracker in far southeast Texas in 2022, followed by an FID in 2023 on an USD8 billion joint venture petrochemical complex along the US Gulf Coast in 2023.

Ethylene and propylene are the main feedstocks for the production of polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP), respectively.

According to MRC's ScanPlast report, Russia's estimated PE consumption totalled 2,487,450 tonnes in 2021, up by 13% year on year. Shipments of all grades of ethylene polymers increased. At the same time, PP shipments to the Russian market totalled 1,494.280 tonnes, up by 21% year on year. Deliveries of homopolymer PP and PP block copolymers increased, whreas.shipments of PP random copolymers decreased significantly.

Headquartered in San Ramon, California, Chevron Corporation is the the second-largest integrated energy company in the United States and among the largest corporations in the world. Chevron is involved in upstream activities including exploration and production, downstream activities including refining, marketing and transportation, and advanced energy technology. Chevron is also invested in power generation and gasification processes.
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Japan’s Mitsui & Co and Indonesian state-owned energy and petrochemicals company Pertamina are looking at commercial opportunities for carbon capture, utilisation and storage (CCUS) in Indonesia, said Reuters.

CCUS infrastructure is a factor in decisions where to locate new chemical plants. The companies have launched a feasibility study to evaluate the carbon dioxide (CO2) subsurface storage capacity of Indonesian oil and gas fields whose production volume has been declining.

Among those are the Duri and Minas oil fields in the Rokan Block on Sumatra, which is operated by Pertamina. The plan is to “examine potential commercialisation toward the establishment of a CCUS value chain”, including capture and transportation of CO2 emitted from industrial plants, power generation plants, and other facilities, Mitsui said.

The partners will also look into the potential of receiving CO2 from other nations, including Japan, via ship transportation, aiming to create new low-carbon solution business in Indonesia.

Mitsui added it would promote initiatives toward the creation of a CCUS value chain in the Asia-Pacific region through the partnership with Pertamina, thereby accelerating CCUS commercialisation projects around the globe.

"CCUS is expected to play a significant role in helping the Asia-Pacific region achieve a low-carbon economy while meeting its growing energy demand,” said Toru Iijima, an executive with Mitsui’s Energy Solution Business Unit.

“Leveraging our expertise in the oil and gas upstream business and extensive business networks, both of which represent Mitsui's strengths, we will work closely with Pertamina to provide industrial CO2 reduction solutions in Indonesia,” he said. Financial or other terms were not disclosed.

As per MRC, Olin Corp. (Calyton, Mo.) and Mitsui & Co., Ltd. (Tokyo) announced a global strategic alliance to better serve customers. The companies have agreed to a memorandum of understanding to establish a joint venture that brings together Mitsui’s top-notch global logistics, deep supplier and customer relationships, and breadth of product portfolio with Olin’s scale, North American export capability, and production flexibility across the electrochemical unit (ECU) portfolio.

As per MRC, Mitsui Chemicals, Maruzen Petrochemical Co., Toyo Engineering Corporation and Sojitz Machinery Corporation announced that a joint pilot project to be demonstrated by the four companies is to be funded by the New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization.

As MRC informed before, earlier this month, Covestro entered into an agreement with Mitsui Chemicals on the supply of raw materials phenol and acetone from ISCC Plus certified mass-balanced sources. Both components will be used for the production of polycarbonate at Covestro's Asian sites in Shanghai, China, and Map Ta Phut, Thailand. The high-performance plastic is used, for example, in car headlights, LED lights, electronic and medical devices and automotive glazing. Japan's Mitsui Chemicals and Mitsui & Co., Ltd are already a long-standing supplier to Covestro.

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