Arkema makes executive appointments

Arkema SA has announced a number of new appointments and changes to its executive committee, said the company.

The company has appointed Sophie Fouillat executive vice president/strategy, effective Oct. 1, 2024, replacing Bernard Boyer who is retiring. Since 2022, Fouillat has been strategy and M&A director at Arkema’s Bostik adhesives business.

Meanwhile, Tilo Quink has joined Arkema to take up, from Sept. 1, the post of senior vice president/performance additives, a position previously held by Laurent Tellier. Quink joined from Henkel AG where, since 2019, he was global director of the company’s packaging adhesives, coatings and sealants business.

Tellier, a member of the executive committee and currently senior vice president/performance additives, has been appointed senior vice president/high-performance polymers and fluorogases, effective Sept. 1, replacing Erwoan Pezron. Tellier has been senior vice president/performance additives since 2023.

Pezron will become advisor to Arkema chairman and CEO Thierry Le Henaff while remaining a member of the executive committee until Pezron’s retirement at the end of the year.

Following the appointments, Arkema will have 10 executive committee members including Le Henaff, Fouillat, Quink and Tellier.

We remind, Arkema and ProLogium held an LOI (letter of intent) exchange ceremony in Paris, deepening the collaboration that began in 2010 and that will accelerate following ProLogium’s intention to establish an advanced R&D laboratory in France, home to Arkema’s flagship Battery Center of Excellence, demonstrating one more time Arkema’s ability to work with the leaders of the batteries of tomorrow, bringing its large suite of technologies to help develop batteries that are more efficient, safer, and more sustainable.

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PPG Industries Inc. announced that it plans to sell its precipitated silica products business to Qemetica SA (Warsaw) for USD310 million.

The deal comes after a strategic review of the business, which was announced in January. It is expected to close in the fourth quarter of this year.

The business is a global provider of precipitated silicas used as additives in a number of applications. It has about 400 employees and generated about 1%-2% of PPG’s total sales of about USD17.7 billion in 2023. The deal includes manufacturing facilities in Louisiana and the Netherlands. Qemetica will also lease manufacturing and research and development facilities in Ohio and Pennsylvania.

“This transaction will allow us to further focus our resources on our technology-differentiated coatings and specialty products businesses to accelerate our organic growth and drive increased shareholder value creation,” said PPG chairman and CEO Tim Knavish.

Qemetica is a privately-held producer of soda ash, vacuum salt and silicates with a major presence in Central Europe. The company generated about USD1.22 billion in sales and USD132 million in operating income in 2023, according to S&P Capital IQ.

PPG is the world’s fifth-largest producer of precipitated silica, accounting for about 5% of global production in 2021, according to “Chemical Economics Handbook: Silicates and Silicas” by S&P Global Commodity Insights. Evonik is the largest producer in the world, followed by Solvay, Madhu Silica and Quechen Silicon Chemical.

PPG is also reviewing its US and Canada architectural coatings business for a possible sale.

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US private equity firm The Chatterjee Group wants to build a petrochemical complex in India, Bloomberg reports.

TCG is in talks with Oil & National Gas and its Hindustan Petroleum unit on a planned project worth more than USD10 billion in the southern Indian city of Cuddalore in Tamil Nadu.

TCG's proposal: the Indian oil companies would jointly own 49% of the venture, while TCG, which does business in India through Haldia Petrochemicals, would own 51%.

Demand for chemical and petrochemical products in India is expected to triple to USD1 trillion by 2040, accounting for more than 10% of global growth in this segment.

Most refiners, including billionaire Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Industries, are focusing more on petrochemicals than traditional fuels to meet demand in a fast-growing market for specialty plastics, solar panel chemicals and electric vehicles.

The TCG project has the capacity to produce 3.5 million tonnes of ethylene and propylene per annum by 2029, Haldia Chairman Navaneet Narayan said in April.

Earlier, JPFL Films, a subsidiary of flexible packaging maker Jindal Poly Films, announced a capacity expansion with a new biaxially oriented polypropylene (BOPP) line in Nashik, Maharashtra, India. The new line, which is expected to be commissioned in the second half of fiscal 2025-26, will have a capital expenditure of INR 250 crore (USD 29.7 million).

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Sibur Holding PJSC, Russia’s largest petrochemicals producer, has announced plans to establish a pilot facility for basic polymer and catalyst technologies at Tobolsk to accelerate the development of new products, said the company.

The new center will be integrated into the company’s research and development infrastructure and become an important link in scaling up new products and components from the laboratory stage to industrial production, it said. Total investment in the facility will be more than 6 billion rubles ($66 million), it said. The plant will have a design capacity for up to 300 metric tons per year.

“Previously, all laboratory developments were sent for testing directly to production, but now we will be able to test them in a separate center without taking the company’s main production facilities out of industrial modes for this purpose,” said Daria Borisova, managing director/development and innovation at Sibur. The company expects annually to be able to test at least five new catalysts and 10 grades of polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP), it said. In the future, the pilot center will open up additional opportunities for the potential licensing of catalyst technologies, it said.

Russia currently produces about 5.3 million metric tons per year (MMt/y) of PE and PP, with the potential to increase to about 6 MMt/y by 2028, according to Sibur.

Sibur plans to complete construction of the facility by the end of September, followed by commissioning and testing by the end of this year, it said. The company said it is also considering a catalyst production plant in Tatarstan, without disclosing further details.

Sibur has so far this year announced several planned expansions of its polymer and chemical production facilities, including a 300,000 metric tons per year PE expansion and a 1 MMt/y ethylbenzene, styrene and polystyrene complex at its subsidiary Nizhnekamskneftekhim in Tatarstan.

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U.S. crude oil and gasoline inventories fell last week as demand picked up ahead of Labor Day weekend and the end of the summer driving season, the Energy Information Administration (EIA) said on Wednesday, as per Hydrocarbonprocessing.

Crude stocks fell by 846,000 bbl to 425.2 MMbbl in the week ended Aug. 23, data showed, far less than analysts' expectations in a Reuters poll for a 2.3-MMbbl draw. Stocks at the Cushing, Oklahoma, delivery hub for U.S. crude futures fell by 668,000 bbl in the week, the EIA said.

Global benchmark Brent and U.S. crude futures extended losses after the data showed the lower-than-expected draw. Refinery crude runs rose by 175,000 bpd and refinery utilization rates rose by 1% to 93.3% of total capacity.

Gasoline stocks fell by 2.2 MMbbl in the week to 218.4 MMbbl, their lowest since November. The draw was deeper than forecasts for a 1.6-MMbbl draw. Gulf Coast gasoline stocks fell sharply to their lowest since March 2021, drawing down 2.8 MMbbl to 76.3 MMbbl. U.S. gasoline futures pared losses following the data.

"Despite apparent robust refinery runs, gasoline inventories drew amid stronger implied demand as we are in the last hurrah of summer driving season, and gas stations are likely stocking up ahead of the Labor Day weekend," said Matt Smith, energy analyst at Kpler, referring to the upcoming holiday weekend which marks the end of the peak summer driving season.

Gasoline supplied, a proxy for demand, rose on the week to 9.3 MMbpd, up from 9.2 MMbpd. Distillate stockpiles, which include diesel and heating oil, rose by 300,000 bbl in the week to 123.1 MMbbl, versus expectations for a 1.1-MMbbl drop, the data showed.

U.S. heating oil futures extended their losses after the data. Net U.S. crude imports rose last week by 282,000 bpd to 2.9 MMbpd and exports fell 374,000 bpd to 3.7 MMbpd, the EIA said. "Ongoing strength in imports and a tick lower in exports helped keep the draw in check," Kpler's Smith said.

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