Business & Economics
SNC-Lavalin lands EPC contract for thickened-mine-tailings project in Chile
SNC-Lavalin Inc. (Montreal, Quebec, Canada; www.snclavalin.com) has been awarded a contract by Compañía Minera del Pacífico S.A. (CAP Minería), to provide overall management, detailed engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) services for a thickened mine tailings disposal system at the Cerro…
Leading economic indicator increases, but suggests sub-par growth in 2013
The American Chemistry Council (ACC; Washington, D.C.; www.americanchemistry.com) today released its monthly Chemical Activity Barometer (CAB), a leading economic indicator derived from a composite index of chemical industry activity. The September CAB showed a 0.3% growth over the previous month.…
Novo Nordisk opens new, bigger R&D center in China
As the first multinational company to open a research center in China in 1997, Novo Nordisk A/S (Bagsværd, Denmark; www.novonordisk.com) now reaffirms its long-term commitment to the country by investing an additional $100 million to expand its state-of-the-art science facilities…
Wacker builds new dispersions plant in South Korea
Wacker Chemie AG (Munich, Germany; www.wacker.com) is expanding its production capacity in South Korea for vinyl acetate-ethylene copolymer (VAE) dispersions. The company is constructing a new plant with an annual capacity of 40,000 metric tons (m.t.) at its site in…
JGC Subsidiary awarded contract for aromatics project in Saudi Arabia
JGC Corp. (Yokohama, Japan; www.jgc.co.jp) says that its wholly-owned Saudi Arabian subsidiary, JGC Gulf International Co., has been awarded a contract for an aromatics plant project from Sadara Chemical Co. (Sadara), a joint venture between Saudi Arabia Oil Company (Saudi…
UOP MTO technology selected to convert coal to petrochemicals in China
UOP LLC (Des Plaines, Ill.; www.uop.com), a Honeywell company, announced today that China’s Jiutai Energy (Zhungeer) Co. Ltd. has licensed UOP’s methanol-to-olefins (MTO) technology to convert methanol from coal into key plastics building blocks. The UOP/Hydro MTO process converts methanol…
CPRI up slightly globally, but down for U.S., ACC says
The Global Chemical Production Regional Index (Global CPRI) rose 0.1% in August, according to the American Chemistry Council (ACC; Washington, D.C.; www.americanchemistry.com). While the Global CPRI gain continues a string of gains for the past several months, the pace has…
Huber plans to increase silica capacity in Tennessee
Huber Engineered Materials (Atlanta, Ga.; www.hubermaterials.com, a division of J.M. Huber Corporation, has announced that it is increasing capacity at its precipitated silica plant in Etowah, Tenn. The expansion will add 14,000 metric tons annually (m.t./yr) at Etowah and is…
ICCA calls for better chemicals-management approach
At the third session of the International Conference on Chemicals Management, the International Council of Chemical Associations called on stakeholders to take action to strengthen the Strategic Approach to International Chemicals Management (SAICM), in order to improve and enhance the…
ECHA strengthens its compliance check strategy
The European Chemicals Agency (ECHA; Helsinki, Finland; echa.europa.eu) is introducing a new, systematic targeting of compliance checks based on specified concerns. This will increase the chances of dossiers of insufficient compliance to be scrutinized and ensure higher compliance of REACH…