Ineos Styrolution May Expand SM on US Gulf

Styrenics specialist Ineos Styrolution, since 2016 wholly owned by the Ineos group, has reportedly applied to the state government of Texas for tax incentives to realize plans for an $800 million expansion of its LaPorte complex on the Gulf Coast.

According to the usually well informed newspaper Houston Chronicle, the documents filed with the state government call for a new facility that would produce 850,000 t/y of ethylbenzene-based styrene monomer (SM).

The project is still at an early stage, and management of the Frankfurt, Germany-based Ineos subsidiary has not yet taken a final investment decision, but preliminary engineering and design work is believed to have been commissioned last year.

 If all goes to plan, construction work could start in the first quarter of 2021, and the plant, which would be operated by Ineos Styrolution America, could go on stream by the fourth quarter of 2023. This would be in line with Ineos’s usual strategy of announcing investment plans three to four years ahead of start-up.

Ineos Styrolution, from 2011 to 2016 a joint venture with BASF, has not yet confirmed the Chronicle’s report that it is seeking tax incentives. However, the company said in early 2018 it planned to build a new SM plant on the US Gulf Coast, using ethane feedstock derived from the region’s abundant shale gas supply.

In addition to La Porte, according to the Texas filing the project planners are also looking at potential sites in Pasadena, Green Lake and Chocolate Bayou, Texas, along with Mobile, Alabama, and Jackson County, Mississippi.

Currently, Ineos Styrolution operates an SM plant at Bayport, Texas, with nameplate capacity of 780,000 t/y. Following the buyout of Total’s PS activities in China, it also is deepening its footprint in the People’s Republic.

In downstream plans for the US Gulf, the Ineos offshoot confirmed at the end of 2018 that it would go ahead with a new 100,000 t/y plant for the specialty styrenic polymer ASA at its Bayport, Texas, site. Australian engineering group WorleyParsons has the contract for engineering, procurement and construction of the facility due to go on stream in 2021.

Parallel to this, Styrolution is increasing capacity for ASA at Altamira, Mexico by 70,000 t. The two expansion projects it said, will allow more flexibility to produce specialty grades.

According to the industry association American Chemistry Council, 334 chemical and plastics projects cumulatively valued at $204 billion have been announced for the Gulf Coast to date, nearly all fueled by the shale gas “revolution.” Beyond its domestic consumption, the US is now world’s largest shale gas exporter.