BASF and Chinese state-owned petrochemical giant Sinopec plan to build a new 40,000 t/y plant for neopentylglycol (NPG) at the integrated production site in Nanjing, China, operated by their 50:50 joint venture BASF-YPC.

The world-scale facility, which will benefit from backward integration, is due to go on stream at the end of 2015.

NPG, a polyalcohol claimed to offer superior performance, is used mainly as a building block for polyester resins for coatings, unsaturated polyester and alkyd resins, lubricants and plasticizers. 

With production facilities at its Ludwigshafen home base, as well as at Freeport, Texas, in the U.S. and Jilin, China, The German group claims global market leadership.

Sanjeev Ghandi, president of BASF's intermediates division, said the group is responding to growing demand for NPG, especially in Asia-Pacific, while at the same time strengthening its position as leading supplier.