DowDuPont has announced plans to invest approximately $100 million over the next two years to modernize and expand capacity at its Sabine River Works plant in Orange County, Texas, USA.

A series of investments will incrementally expand capacity for the specialty materials produced at the facility, including Surlyn ionomer resins; Nucrel ethylene acrylic acid and methacrylic acid copolymer resins; Fusabond modified polymers and Vamac ethylene acrylic elastomers.

Longer-term plans to invest in a new facility to further support market growth are also being evaluated.

“We see tremendous potential to deliver more supply of these iconic specialty products to our customers in the food packaging and consumer goods markets,” said Diego Donoso, business president for Dow P&SP.

Randy Stone, business president for DuPont T&AP, added: “With this increased capacity, we will be able to support growth in the automotive space at a time when customer demand for our advanced polymers is very strong.”

The additional capacity is expected to come on stream in several phases starting in 2020.

The company said the investments would support customer growth of both the Packaging & Specialty Plastics (P&SP) business of DowDuPont’s Materials Science division (to be named Dow) as well as the Transportation & Advanced Polymers (T&AP) business of its Specialty Products division (to be named DuPont).

The spinoff of the Materials Science division is set for the end of the first quarter of 2019, while the Specialty Products division is expected to separate by Jun. 1, 2019.