South Korea’s Lotte Chemical and GS Energy are jointly investing 800bn won ($679mn) to build new C4 fractionation and bisphenol A (BPA) chain plants at Lotte's petrochemical complex in Yosu.
The C4 fractionation plant (scheduled to open in 2022) is expected to have an annual capacity of 215,000 tons of C4 fractionation products, including 90,000 t/yr of butadiene (BD), 70,000 t/yr of tertiary butyl alcohol (TBA), 40,000 t/yr of 1-butene and 15,000 t/yr of methyl tert-butyl ether (MTBE).
On the other hand, the BPA plant will have an annual capacity of 200,000 tons of BPA, 350,000 t/yr of phenol and 220,000 t/yr of acetone. It is scheduled to be operational in 2023.
GS Caltex (a JV between GS and Chevron) will supply feedstock such as propylene and benzene to Lotte GS. Meanwhile Lotte will use its BPA products to drive down costs of its polycarbonates.
Lotte has also invested in a heavy-feed-based petrochemical complex in Daesan, south of Seoul – which is a JV with Hyundai Oilbank. The heavy-feed cracker will produce 750,000 t/yr of ethylene and 400,000 t/yr of propylene at full capacity.
Other investments include – expanding the production of acetic acid and vinyl acetate monomer (VAM) through a JV with BP in the southeastern port city of Ulsan as well as a naphtha cracker in Indonesia with a capacity to produce 1mn t/yr of ethylene and related products.
Lotte also owns a 88% of a joint venture with Atlanta-based Westlake subsidiary Axiall, which started a new 1mn t/yr ethane cracker in the US state of Louisiana.
For more insights on the latest investments and capacity expansions in the phenol and acetone market, attend CMT’s 17th Asia Phenol/Acetone & Derivatives in Singapore.
