Bayer MaterialScience (BMS) has inaugurated its new 300,000 t/y TDI plant at Dormagen, Germany, built at a cost of €250 million. The world-scale facility replaces a smaller production unit with a capacity of 60,000 t/y.

Including infrastructure and supplier costs, BMS said its investment in Bayer's Chempark Dormagen totals more than €400 million.

The German site is planned to become the plastics producer's European hub for TDI, for which it expects demand to grow "steadily" in coming years.

At the inauguration ceremony, Bayer MaterialScience CEO Patrick Thomas cited the gas-phase technology developed at Bayer as an example of the German group's innovative strength. The plant is claimed to be particularly energy and resource efficient.

"Compared with a conventional plant with the same capacity, the new facility will reduce energy consumption by up to 60% and require as much as 80% less solvent," Thomas said, adding that "this also gives us an important competitive advantage."

Bayer's Dormagen TDI complex, where a plant for starting material TDA is already in place, is completely back-integrated. A CO pipeline to connect Dormagen to its sister site at Uerdingen is still being held up by safety concerns of residents along the route.

Commenting on the Bayer holding's plans to float its plastics sub-group on the stock market, Thomas said "BMS is ideally prepared for independence."

The company, he added, "is superbly positioned worldwide and optimally prepared to operate independently. Our products are in demand, our customers value our innovative power, and we are leaders in our markets."