Two dead, 9 injured, 4 missing in blast at Eni site near Florence

Two people died, nine were injured and four were missing after an explosion on Monday at a fuel storage facility owned by Italian energy group Eni near Florence, as per Reuters.

The explosion occurred in Calenzano on the northern outskirts of the Tuscan capital in a loading area but did not affect the site's fuel storage facilities, an ENI spokesman said.

"All of Tuscany is united in grief for the tragedy that happened today in Calenzano," regional president Eugenio Giani wrote on social media.

Firefighters said the fire had been put out, while Italy's Civil Protection agency urged the local population to stay away from the site and stay indoors.

The fire produced a thick column of smoke, visible from a distance. Experts from the Regional Environment Protection Agency were on site to assess any potential environmental damage, including on waterways, Giani said.

We remind, Eni has entered into an agreement with Energy Infrastructure Partners (EIP) to increase EIP's stake in Plenitude. The deal is worth €209 million. EIP's total investment is approximately €800 million, including €588 million paid in March last year.

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Russian petrochemicals giant Sibur plans to list about 2% of its shares in an initial public offering on Russia's Eastern Exchange in the coming months, as per Hydrocarbonprocessing.

Russian listings have been thin on the ground since the exodus of Western capital after Moscow sent troops into Ukraine in February 2022, but a handful of small capital raises dominated by local retail investors has breathed some life into moribund equity capital markets.

A public debut by Sibur, which has been on the cards for several years, would represent a more significant step.

Russian business newspaper RBC first reported the plans, while Kommersant sources said Sibur planned to attract several tens of billions of roubles in the offering.

During the offering, Sibur may offer both existing shares and those from a stake held by the Russian treasury, which is currently about 1.3%, Reuters' sources said. "The market will tell, but enterprise value including debt is significantly higher than 3 trillion roubles ($28.74 billion)," one of the sources said.

In 2022, after merging with petrochemicals firm TAIF, Sibur's leading shareholders were Leonid Mikhelson, head of gas producer Novatek, with a 30.6% stake, and Gennady Timchenko, a billionaire friend of Russian President Vladimir Putin, controlling 14.5%.

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The first in Brazil, Yara now produces ammonia made from renewable biomethane and has already delivered the first tons of lower carbon product to its customers, as per Hydrocarbonprocessing.

A purified biogas made from sugarcane waste, biomethane can seamlessly replace fossil natural gas, reducing greenhouse gas emissions by up to 75%.

Decarbonizing food and industrial value chains. This achievement demonstrates Yara’s commitment to decarbonizing the food and industrial value chains as the company progresses toward carbon neutrality by 2050.

"This is a significant step in building renewable-based value chains across sectors and industries, from food and mining to on-and off-shore transport,” said Marcelo Altieri, President of Yara Brazil. “For agribusiness the impact is huge. By integrating this new generation of lower carbon fertilizers into our agronomic expertise, we offer farmers greater value while unlocking new markets and revenue streams. In coffee farming alone, we anticipate a reduction of up to 40% in the carbon footprint of harvested beans.”

Yara’s Industrial Complex in Cubatao, the largest consumer of natural gas in Sao Paulo and Brazil’s leading ammonia producer, is now fully equipped to operate with biomethane.

“Cubatao is now positioned to lead Brazil’s energy transition,” said Daniel Hubner, Senior Vice President at Yara Industrial Solutions. “By leveraging biomethane, Brazil can transform its vast organic waste into a valuable resource, accelerating the transition to a fair, efficient, and sustainable energy model.”

Hubner also highlights the importance of collaboration: “Brazil has the potential to be a global leader. To realize this, we must scale renewable solutions, create incentives, and foster public-private partnership to make these innovations accessible and impactful.”

Yara plans to expand its portfolio to include products utilizing carbon capture and storage (CCS). This initiative underscores Yara’s leadership in driving industrial decarbonization and supporting sustainable growth in Brazil and on the global stage.

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Taiwan's Formosa Chemicals and Fibre Corp. plans to keep its 1.2 million metric tons per year (MMt/y) purified terephthalic acid (PTA) line at Ningbo, mainland China, as well as its 600,000 metric tons per year line at Loong-Der, Taiwan shut indefinitely due to weak margins, as per Chemweek.

The company had shut the Ningbo line from Sept. 1 for a planned turnaround, which was supposed to last around a month. However, post-completion, the line remains shut due to weak margins and is unlikely to be started any time soon, the source said to Commodity Insights. The Loong-Der line will also remain shut on account of poor margins.

The Ningbo plant has another line of 1.5 MMt/y, which is running at 100% currently, while Formosa has one PTA line at its Mailiao plant with a capacity of 550,000 metric tons per year, which is also operating at 100%, the source said.

We remind, Formosa Plastics (USA) announced a significant expansion of its polyvinyl chloride (PVC) plant in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, USA. The company did not specify the exact volume of capacity increase.

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KazTransOil JSC pumped 9.117 million tonnes of Russian oil in January-November of this year through Kazakhstan to China, the company said, as per Interfax.

This is a decrease of just 0.25% compared with the same period of 2023, when the volume of Russian oil transportation stood at 9.140 million tonnes.

In December 2024, KazTransOil plans to pump 862,000 tonnes of Russian oil to China through Kazakhstan.
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