Sika opened a new plant in Bolivia

Sika AG (Baar, Switzerland) has opened a new plant in Santa Cruz de la Sierra, thus doubling its production capacity for mortar and concrete admixtures in Bolivia, said he company.

With this new facility in one of the country’s main industrial agglomerations, Sika is positioning itself for continued growth in the dynamic Bolivian construction market.

Sika’s new production facility for mortar and concrete admixtures is located outside of Santa Cruz de la Sierra in the country’s largest industrial park. It replaces the existing plant and effectively doubles the usable space. In addition to its excellent transport connections, the newly occupied site also has space for future expansion. The manufacturing plant, which is highly automated, not only increases efficiency but will also help make production more sustainable. Over and above this, Sika has expanded its warehousing capacity and administrative premises and has set up a training center for customers.

Christoph Ganz, Regional Manager Americas: “The clear strategic focus of our business activities on major cities and agglomerations in the Americas region is proving to be highly successful. We now have over 20 national subsidiaries and 89 production plants in the Americas. We continue to invest in the expansion of our presence in fast-growing markets. This recent investment in Bolivia enables us to continue to grow our output volumes in the dynamic Bolivian construction market."

As per MRC, Sika has agreed to sell Aliva Equipment, a Swiss unit supplying machines for the application of shotcrete, to Normet Group Oy, a Finnish global company providing solutions for underground construction. In 2021, Aliva Equipment generated sales of CHF 12 million.
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MRC) -- Worley has announced that its strategic partnership with Avantium Renewable Polymers is now progressing to the next phase. Worley previously announced the partnership on 29 January 2021, said Hydrocarbonengineering.

Following the recent positive final investment decision (FID), Worley and Avantium have signed a technology cooperation agreement and Worley will now deliver engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) services to develop the Avantium flagship facility in Delfzijl, the Netherlands.

The facility will be a world-first commercial scale renewable plastics facility producing up to 5000 kilo tpy plant-based furandicarboxylic acid (FDCA). FDCA is a key building block for many chemicals and plastics, such as polyethylene furanoate (PEF), a fully recyclable plastic. This facility will be the commercial proof for future larger scale projects.

Worley’s EPC services will be executed by the company’s offices in the Netherlands and Belgium, with support from Worley’s Global Integrated Delivery (GID) team in India.

“We are excited to strengthen our strategic partnership with Avantium, a leader in advancing the circular economy. This partnership supports Worley’s Ambition focusing on sustainability and delivering a more sustainable world,” said Chris Ashton, Chief Executive Officer of Worley.

As per MRC, Worley has bagged a front-end engineering and design (FEED) services contract from Trinseo for its first-of-a-kind chemical recycling plant in Belgium. Trinseo is a global materials company and manufacturer of plastics and latex binders. The plant will use gasification technology to depolymerise post-consumer polystyrene waste into pure styrene. It’s a first-of-its-kind project on an industrial scale.
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Axens and Toray Films Europe have plans to establish a new Pet chemical recycling facility in Saint-Maurice-de-Beynost, France, said the company.

The new units will make use of Axens’ Rewind Pet technology along with Toray Films Europe’s existing polymerization plant to recycle 80,000 tons of Pet plastic waste every year.

Axens and Toray Films Europe have recently announced their collaboration to study a Pet chemical recycling facility at Toray Films Europe production site in Saint-Maurice-de-Beynost (Ain, France). New units based on Axens’ Rewind Pet technology will be coupled with Toray Films Europe’s existing polymerization plant in order to recycle annually 80,000 tons of difficult-to-recycle Pet plastic waste. Joined efforts of both parties in their domain of expertise will allow the emergence of competencies for chemical recycling circularity. Polycarbonate Sheet – Chemical Recycling.

Post consumers Pet plastic waste that cannot be mechanically recycled and are currently down-cycled, incinerated or landfilled, will be converted into high-quality circular Pet chips, closing the loop for this material with potentially infinite recycling. Rewind Pet process, developed by IFP Energies nouvelles, Axens and Jeplan, involves an optimized – glycolysis based – Pet depolymerization combined with specific purification steps aiming at removing all organic and inorganic compounds present in waste Pet, including colorants and pigments. The product is a purified BHET (BHET: Bis(2-HydroxyEthyl) Terephthalate) monomer.

As per MRC, Fuhaichuang Petrochemical has selected Axens’ ebullatedbed residue hydrocracking technology (H-Oil) for a capacity of 1.5 MTA as the key unit of its residue upgrading plan in its petrochemical complex located in the port of Gulei, Fujian Province, China.

As MRC informed earlier, in January, 2022, SOCAR HQ held a ceremony to sign licensing and design agreements for the fluid catalytic cracking (FCC) unit between the Heydar Aliyev oil refinery (HAOR) and the French company Axens as part of the HAOR modernization and reconstruction project. It is worth noting that SOCAR and Axens have a long-term co-operation. At present, the diesel hydrotreatment, gasoline hydrotreatment and C4 (butane-butylene) hydrogenation units as part of the Heydar Aliyev refinery reconstruction project, as well as the C3 (propane-propylene) hydrogenation unit as part of the reconstruction works carried out at Azerkimya PU, the naphtha hydrotreatment, diesel hydrotreatment and kerosene hydrotreatment units at the STAR refinery built in Turkey are licensed by Axens.
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New Hope Energy has announced plans to build a chemical recycling facility in Texas, in conjunction with a partial offtake agreement with TotalEnergies, said the company.

Similar to New Hope Energy’s original facility in Tyler, Texas, this new facility will utilise Lummus Technologies pyrolysis process technology and will be able to process 310,000 tonnes/year of mixed plastic waste. New Hope Energy will target mixed plastic waste feedstock from material recovery facility (MRF) mixed plastic bales, among other sources. The plant is expected to be online in 2025.

TotalEnergies will receive 100,000 tonnes of pyrolysis oil, with the intention of manufacturing sustainable polymers for food-grade applications. This comes as Missouri is in the final stages of signing into law House Bill 2485, a piece of legislation which supports chemical recycling operations, which they deem “advanced recycling”. Should the bill become law, Missouri would be the 19th state to adopt such legislation, following Mississippi, Kentucky, West Virginia and South Carolina earlier this year.

The terminology “advanced recycling” is opposed by many organisations as it can be misleading as to the physical process of recycling and the marketing qualities of the technology. Many chemical recycling technologies have existed for years, though only recently have companies commissioned production units. This bill will amend the legal definitions of chemical recycling processes such as pyrolysis, solvolysis, gasification and depolymerization such that they would no longer be categorised under categories like “solid waste processing” or “incineration”.

This would mean the investment, construction and running of chemical recycling facilities covered under these laws could grant them funding, taxation or environmental regulation as a recycling facility rather than as a waste to fuel or disposal facility. Moreover, adopting the legal definition of recycling opens the door for chemically recycled material to be used in future post-consumer recycled content mandates or as marketable recycled material. Despite the legal support chemical recyclers estimate that it will take at least another seven to 10 years to reach true commercial scale, and the bulk of the industry remains at pilot stage.

As per MRC, Grupa Lotos said it is not processing oil for TotalEnergies' Leuna refinery in Germany, referring to a statement by the Polish climate minister that this was the case as a "slip of the tongue". Poland's Climate Minister Anna Moskwa said on Friday the Gdansk refinery owned by Lotos was processing oil for the Leuna refinery.

MRC also reminds, TotalEnergies and ENEOS hasve announced a collaboration to jointly conduct a feasibility study to assess the production of sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) in ENEOS' Negishi refinery in Yokohama city, Japan.
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For this week, total U.S. weekly rail traffic was 505,120 carloads and intermodal units, down 5.4 percent compared with the same week last year, according to data from the Association of American Railroads (AAR).

Total carloads for the week ending May 14 were 230,128 carloads, down 5.2 percent compared with the same week in 2021, while U.S. weekly intermodal volume was 274,992 containers and trailers, down 5.5 percent compared to 2021.

Three of the 10 carload commodity groups posted an increase compared with the same week in 2021. They were nonmetallic minerals, up 1,570 carloads, to 33,344; farm products excl. grain, and food, up 993 carloads, to 16,257; and motor vehicles and parts, up 625 carloads, to 13,097. Commodity groups that posted decreases compared with the same week in 2021 included coal, down 4,317 carloads, to 64,015; grain, down 3,561 carloads, to 21,910; and metallic ores and metals, down 2,289 carloads, to 21,426.

For the first 19 weeks of 2022, U.S. railroads reported cumulative volume of 4,368,828 carloads, up 0.6 percent from the same point last year; and 5,001,231 intermodal units, down 6.9 percent from last year. Total combined U.S. traffic for the first 19 weeks of 2022 was 9,370,059 carloads and intermodal units, a decrease of 3.5 percent compared to last year.

North American rail volume for the week ending May 14, 2022, on 12 reporting U.S., Canadian and Mexican railroads totaled 325,431 carloads, down 4.2 percent compared with the same week last year, and 367,153 intermodal units, down 4.2 percent compared with last year. Total combined weekly rail traffic in North America was 692,584 carloads and intermodal units, down 4.2 percent. North American rail volume for the first 19 weeks of 2022 was 12,770,815 carloads and intermodal units, down 3.9 percent compared with 2021.

Canadian railroads reported 74,072 carloads for the week, down 5.1 percent, and 76,004 intermodal units, down 1.8 percent compared with the same week in 2021. For the first 19 weeks of 2022, Canadian railroads reported cumulative rail traffic volume of 2,691,713 carloads, containers and trailers, down 6.7 percent.

Mexican railroads reported 21,231 carloads for the week, up 12.6 percent compared with the same week last year, and 16,157 intermodal units, up 9.5 percent. Cumulative volume on Mexican railroads for the first 19 weeks of 2022 was 709,043 carloads and intermodal containers and trailers, up 3.1 percent from the same point last year.

As per MRC, North American chemical railcar traffic rose for a seventh straight week, according to data for the week ended 26 March from the Association of American Railroads (AAR).
For the first 12 weeks of 2022 ended 26 March, North American chemical railcar traffic was up 5.2% year on year to 562,331 railcar loadings.
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