Chemical Today August 2017

Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

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Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

CHEMICAL

TODAY

Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

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Chemical Today

is a monthly magazine focused on chemistry & the chemical industry.

CONTENTS COATINGS SPECIAL

QUOTES 04

INDUSTRIAL COATINGS 32

NEWS NATIONAL 06 INTERNATIONAL 08 MAKE A DIFFERENCE 10 NEWS ANALYSIS GST 12

EVENTS 14 LUBRICANTS 16 SOLVENTS 18 CATALYSTS 20 GREEN CHEMISTRY

INTERNATIONAL FOCUS

ASIA PACIFIC 46

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COATINGS SPECIAL INDUSTRIAL COATINGS 32 PAINTS & COATINGS 36 COATINGS 38 SURFACE & COATINGS 40 COATINGS 42 ELECTROPLATING 44 INTERNATIONAL FOCUS SINGAPORE 48 REPORT ACRYLIC SURFACE COATINGS AUTOMOTIVE ADHESIVES INDUSTRIAL ADHESIVES PARAXYLENE (PX) MARKET

50 51 52 53

EVENT COVERAGE 54 INTERVIEWS 56

EXPERT VIEWPOINT

ACADEMIC R&D ACADEMIC SPEAK R&D YOUNG TURKS

58 62 64

JOBS 68 PRODUCTS 70 EQUIPMENT POWDER WETTING MACHINE 72 EQUIPMENT 76 GLOSSARY 78 Datuk Sazal Hamzah,

Managing Director & CEO, PETRONAS Chemicals Group (PCG)

Shilip Kumar,

Country President – India, Henkel Adhesive Technologies India Pvt Ltd.

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Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

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Ravi Kapoor,

Managing Director, Heubach Colour Pvt Ltd.

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Published for August 2017.

QUOTES

India being one of the fastest growing economies in the world, and steel finding its extensive application in areas like construction, infrastructure, power, aerospace, industrial machinery and consumer products, the sector is of strategic importance to the country. Owing to the significance of the sector and dynamic scenario in steel sector, the Government came up with National Steel Policy (NSP) 2017. With the roll out the New Steel Policy, it is envisaged that the industry will be steered with appropriate policy support in creating an environment for promoting domestic steel and thereby ensuring that production meets the anticipated pace of growth in demand

Among the government partnerships, we have inked a MoU between India and Australia on handloom, handicraft and fashion sector. Also there is a request from Australian firms to work on improving wool quality in India with Indian companies. India and Chinese government have signed a MoU so that Chinese researchers and National Silk Board can work in tandem in the field of silk research. Silk waste can be harnessed in pharmaceuticals and in beauty products and this MoU will explore opportunities in diversification and on sericulture.

BGMEA University of Fashion and Technology or BUFT from Bangladesh and India’s National Institute of Fashion Technology (NIFT) will partner for an exchange of fashion research.

Chaudhary Birender Singh, Union Minister of Steel.

Smriti Irani, Union Minister of Textile.

We want to bring the various textile value chain and handicrafts sector into one umbrella for its collective growth. We expect that the export of both textiles and handicraft products will go up after organizing events unifying the various sectors. Another major focus is to establish India as a major global sourcing for textiles and investment destination Ajay Tamta, Minister of Gujarat State for Textiles.

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Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

The bullish trend will continue as the demand in China, the largest consumer, is going up. The crude oil price is also looking up, lifting the synthetic rubber prices. This will reflect on the Indian natural rubber sector as well.

C P Krishnan, Whole-time Director, Geofin Comtrade.

The rise of e-commerce and access to new technologies has accelerated counterfeiting and other forms of illicit trade. That makes fighting counterfeit medical products an ever-more urgent priority for pharma companies – both in terms of patient safety and brand reputation.

Yann Ischi, Director, New Channels and Partnerships, SICPA. Within the Volkswagen Group, we have a clear strategy for how we want to put battery-electric vehicles into series production across our brands and in many different market segments. However, a major qualification for success in the volume market is more powerful battery concepts. In Volkswagen Group R&D we are focusing on close cooperation, not only with industrial partners but also with the smart minds of the scientific community.

Dr Ulrich Eichhorn, Head, Group R&D, Volkswagen AG. Using reverse osmosis for pre-treatment means we can reduce the consumption of specific chemicals for resin bed regeneration by around 60 percent.

Ashraf Aly Mostafa, Project Manager, Alexandria Fertilizers Co (Alexfert).

India is a very important market for polyurethanes and has a wonderful potential for growth. When leaders of the industry from all over the world get together under one roof, it leads to better production and faster growth of the industry R C Bhargava, former CEO and current Chairman, Maruti Suzuki.

India today process 565,000 mtpa of polyurethanes and this is expected to cross the 1 million mtpa mark in the next three to four years. Polyurethane is a designers polymer unparalleled by any of its kind when it comes to allowing technologists to chemically design and develop specific end products.

Mukesh Bhuta, Chairman, IPUA and Promoter, Expanded Polymer Systems Pvt. As exports increase, the chemical industry in Germany is growing. In addition, production sites are now scattered across the whole globe. With this in mind, medium-sized companies now see the advantage of having integrated and IT-connected supply chains Rachael Bartels, Managing Director and Chemicals & Natural Resources Global Industry Lead, Accenture.

As exports increase, the chemical industry in Germany is growing. In addition, production sites are now scattered across the whole globe. With this in mind, medium-sized companies now see the advantage of having integrated and IT-connected supply chains.

Michael Kriegel, Department Head, Dachser Chem-Logistics.

The European market for F&F ingredients is well known for its high standards particularly for use in personal care, food & beverage products.

Philippe Faucher, Managing Director, FCI

Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

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NEWS NATIONAL NEW PETROCHEMICAL CLUSTERS TO AUGMENT INDUSTRY GROWTH

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he Union government is planning to set up petrochemical clusters in eastern, western and southern India to spur the growth of the sector with a view to meeting the increasing demand for polymers/plastics and speciality chemicals across diverse industrial segments.

“We plan to set up a number of petrochemical clusters, two each in east and west coasts, and some in south India. They will be created (integrated with refineries) so that the entire chain is benefited,” said Dharmendra Pradhan, minister of state (independent charges) for petroleum and natural gas, adding that this is in line with global trends.

“Global per capita consumption of polymers is 34 kg, so India at 10 kg will see manifold growth by 2030, spurring the growth of the industry,” Pradhan said. India’s petrochemical market is valued at $50 billion, which is expected to grow at the rate of 89 per cent. The Centre is committed to seeing the industry achieve the forecast growth. “We still have to import several building blocks.

Just like we have increased refining capacity, we will ensure that petrochemical requirements are also met.”

Pradhan also pointed out that there is a need for setting up petrochemical clusters downstream, adjacent to the refineries, which will have all the infrastructure for doing business at one place. He said this will create an eco-system of entrepreneurship and employment while at the same time meeting the rising demand for petrochemical intermediates and polymer/plastic products.

He added that ONGC Petro Additions Limited, the largest petrochemical plant in the country set up at Dahej in south Gujarat, has in turn brought in several downstream industries in its vicinity.

This is likely to bring in a cumulative investment of $6-7 billion.

“These complexes make the entire value chain extremely costeffective. The output of petrochemicals will support such an industry,” he said. Demand for petrochemical products has only been increasing in India, with the sharp increase in the population of the middle class set to increase consumption of petrochemical products.

Dharmendra Pradhan, minister of state (independent charges) for petroleum and natural gas inaugurating the sixth edition of the Petrochemicals Conclave in Gandhinagar.

ONGC WINS GOVERNMENT NOD FOR RS 7,738 CRORE GSPC STAKE BUY

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tate-owned Oil and Natural Gas Corp won government approval for acquisition of Gujarat State Petroleum Corp’s entire 80 per cent holding in a KG basin gas block for Rs 7,738 crore, the company said.

ONGC had in December last year agreed to buy entire 80 per cent interest of GSPC along with operatorship rights, in Deen Dayal West (DDW) gas field in Block KGOSN-2001/3 in the Bay of Bengal for $995 million (Rs 6,443 crore).

The company will also pay part consideration of $200 million (Rs 1,295 crore) to GSPC towards acquisition rights for discoveries other than DDW field in the block.

“A farm-in agreement was signed with GSPC on 10 March, with an economic data of 31 March,” ONGC said in notes to its first quarter earning disclosure.

During April-June quarter, “Government of India has approved the acquisition of entire 80 per cent participating interest of GSPC along with operatorship rights,” it said.

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ONGC will make payments to GSPC “On fulfilment of certain conditions precedent,” it said without elaborating. ONGC will pay $995.26 million for three discoveries in the KG-OSN-2001/3 block that are under trial production since August 2014.

Another $200 million will be paid for six other discoveries for which GSPC has been finalising an investment plan to bring them to production. Jubilant Offshore Drilling Pvt Ltd and Geo Global Resources (India) Inc hold 10 per cent stake in the block.

Originally, GSPC had offered ONGC its 50 per cent stake in the block together with operatorship, but the state-owned firm was not interested. Subsequently, GSPC offered its entire 80 per cent stake in the block and ONGC on 23 December last year.

GSPC, with a debt of Rs 19,716.27 crore as on 31 March 2015, has so far made 9 gas discoveries in the Bay of Bengal block.

Of these, three - KG-08, KG-17, KG-15 commonly known as Deendayal West (DDW) fields - have been approved for development. But against an approved field development plan (FDP) cost of

$2.75 billion, GSPC has seen a huge cost overrun, incurring $2.83 billion as on 31 March 2015. Additionally, it had run up an exploration cost of $584.63 million, taking total expenditure as on 31 March 2015, to $3.41 billion. As per the requirement of the field development plan (FDP), 12 more development wells are yet to be completed, which will further bump up the project cost.

The trial production from the DDW field commenced in August 2014, but the average production achieved is only 19.45 million standard cubic feet per day against a targeted commercial production of 200 mmscfd. Commercial production has not commenced as the rate has not yet stabilised. The DGH-approved FDP had envisaged commercial production from December 2011. As per the approved FDP of DDW fields, the estimated oil & gas in place was 1.95 trillion cubic feet (tcf ).

Source: Economic Times

RIL’S PETROCHEM COMPLEX GETS GREEN NOD

File Photo

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eliance Industries got a green signal from the government to expand its petrochemical complex in Gujarat, which entails an investment of Rs 2,100 crore. The complex near Hazira in Surat comprises of naphtha cracker, feeding downstream petrochemical, fibre intermediates and polyester plants. RIL’s proposal is to increase production capacities of these

plants by debottlenecking and expansion through technological upgradation. In a letter to RIL, the Environment Ministry said it has given the environment clearance to RIL’s proposal after taking into account the recommendations of its Expert Appraisal Committee. RIL has also been asked to strengthen the existing green belt by 20 hectare and earmark 2.5 per cent of

the total cost of the project towards the enterprise social responsibility. RIL will complete the debottelenecking of some plants in two years in a phased manner after obtaining the EC and it would take 3-5 years to complete setting up of new plants.

Besides Gujarat, RIL has manufacturing facilities in Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Punjab and Dadar Nagar and Haveli.

COROMANDEL TO INVEST RS 225 CRORE IN EXPANSION PLANS IN AP

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oromandel International Limited, country’s second largest phosphatic fertilizer player, plans Rs 225-crore expansion project for raising production capacity of its facility at Vishakhapatnam in Andhra Pradesh. It recently received environmental clearance for the project.

The company’s proposal is to raise phosphoric acid production capacity from 700 tonnes per day to 1,000 tonnes per day and other auxiliary facilities at Sriharipuram to achieve daily complex fertiliser production of 3,900 tonnes.

The estimated project cost of the proposed upgradation and installations will be Rs 225 crore, out of which, Rs 26.42 crore would be used for environmental management programmes.

The mid-size company has phosphatic fertiliser plants at Visakhapatnam and Kakinada in Andhra Pradesh, and Ennore and Ranipet in Tamil Nadu. It produces phosphatic fertilisers, plant protection chemicals, speciality nutrients, sulphur bentonite and potash.

Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

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NEWS INTERNATIONAL EUROPEAN COMMISSION RAIDS ETHYLENE PURCHASING COMPANIES

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uropean Union (EU) antitrust regulators have raided several ethylene purchasing companies, including Swiss chemicals maker Clariant and US rival Celanese Corporation, over concerns that the firms may have participated in a cartel.

Clariant confirmed the EU investigation, while Celanese said some of its units were being investigated. Ethylene is used to make various chemical and plastic products.

The European Commission said that the raids occurred on May 16 in several European Union countries. It did not name the companies involved.

“The companies concerned may have violated EU antitrust rules that prohibit cartels and restrictive business practices,” the EU competition enforcer said in a statement.

Companies face fines up to 10 percent of their global turnover for breaching EU antitrust rules.

Source: Reuters News

ARKEMA TO DOUBLE THIOCHEMICALS CAPACITY IN MALAYSIA

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rkema announced a project to double its methyl mercaptan production capacity at its Kerteh site in Malaysia. The project should come on stream in 2020 and will represent one of the main pillars of the group’s future growth, the company said.

kerteh-exterior

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Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

This is in line to support the strong growth of the animal feed, petrochemical and refining markets in Asia and to strengthen its world leading position in high valueadded sulphur derivatives. Arkema will double its production capacity of methyl mercaptan, a sulphur-based intermediate that is key to the manufacture of methionine and other sulphur derivatives businesses. Annual growth of these markets is expected to exceed 5 percent in the coming years. Arkema thus confirms its technological leadership in thiochemical (sulphur-based chemicals), processes and ambition to strengthen its world leading position in sulphur derivatives. Thiochemicals is based on high growth world markets such as animal nutrition, oil & gas, agrochemicals and speciality intermediates.

TOSOH TO INCREASE HIGHSILICA ZEOLITE PRODUCTION IN NANYO COMPLEX

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osoh Corporation will be expanding its production capacity for high-silica zeolite (HSZ) at its Nanyo complex in Yamaguchi Prefecture, Japan. Construction there on additional HSZ manufacturing facilities is slated to begin in May 2018 and to conclude in March 2019 at a cost of approximately ¥10 billion ($1.49 billion).

Tosoh produces HSZ in Japan at its Yokkaichi complex as well as its Nanyo complex and overseas in Malaysia. The Nanyo complex’s new facilities will raise Tosoh’s overall HSZ production capacity 30 percent beyond its current level.

HSZ is a synthetic zeolite featuring excellent thermal and acid stability. It is used to reduce environmental impact in purifying catalysts for automobile exhausts, as a catalyst in petroleum refining and petrochemicals production, as well as an adsorption material for volatile organic compounds (VOCs).

High-performance grades of HSZ for use in automobile emission catalysts are especially in demand to meet increasingly stringent emissions standards globally. Demand for HSZ and particularly for its highest grades is expected to grow rapidly, mainly in emerging economies.

The company is aggressively pursuing development of new grades of the product for application in automobile emission catalysts.

LINDE TO EXPAND PRODUCTION IN MALAYSIA

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inde Malaysia Sdn Bhd (Linde), a member of The Linde Group said it will invest €30 million to expand gas and liquid production capacities in central Malaysia. The expansion project is expected to be completed by 2018. Linde will construct and commission a new gas and liquid producing air separation unit (ASU) at its site in Hicom Industrial Estate (Hicom). The investment will enable Linde to meet forecast growth in the central Malaysian region through the next decade. The facility will also form the cornerstone of a renewed and expanding oxygen supply scheme to leading Japanese glass manufacturer, Nippon ElectricGlass Malaysia (NEGM). “There continues to be a healthy growth momentum and expansion activities across a variety of industries in the central region,” said Connell Zhang, managing director, Linde Malaysia.

“Malaysia is a key contributor to our growth strategy in Asia and our track record of steady investment of over €230 million in the past two years underscores our commitment and optimism about Asia,” added Rob Hughes, Linde’s regional managing director, South Asia and ASEAN. “For 20 years, Linde has supplied Nippon Electric Glass Malaysia with consistent and reliable gas solutions to fuel our manufacturing processes, growing together with us,” said Masaya Kubo, managing director, NEGM.

JOHNSON MATTHEY DEVELOPS CATALYST, FILTER SYSTEMS TO REDUCE EMISSIONS

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ohnson Matthey has developed a new technology that reduces emissions from older buses, enabling people to breathe fresh and cleaner air.

The company’s catalysts were installed in one-third of new vehicles worldwide, preventing 40 tonnes of potentially harmful emissions from entering the atmosphere every minute of the day.

Emission control systems, developed by Johnson Matthey and its partners, have already been installed in more than 1,000 London buses to enable them to meet increasingly stringent emissions targets.

The process started with the retrofitting of 54 older buses for the London Olympics that were used to ferry passengers between sites.

These catalyst and filter systems are installed in the exhaust system of a

Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

vehicle. A precious metal catalyst (usually containing platinum and palladium), converts harmful carbon monoxide and hydrocarbons into carbon dioxide and water.

In conjunction with this, another catalyst typically using base metals such as vanadium, copper or iron, converts oxides of nitrogen, or NOx, to nitrogen.

Each installation requires fine tuning and requires careful testing on each type of vehicle. Between these catalysts, a diesel particulate filter traps and then combusts very small soot particles, preventing them from leaving the exhaust.

The technology enables Johnson Matthey and its partners to take a twelve-year-old bus and achieve emissions comparable to those from a modern bus. Approximately fifteen older buses can be retrofitted for

the cost of a brand-new model, conserving natural resources, reducing fleet costs and minimizing environmental impact. The process of developing effective catalysts for London’s fleet of retrofitted buses involves the application of precise science, including a system for injecting low levels of ammonia to react with emissions as they pass through the catalyst. London has a stated objective of achieving an ultra-low emission zone at its heart by 2019 and Johnson Matthey and its partners have already demonstrated that the latest technology is capable of meeting this stringent standard.

“We are working at atomic level on a global scale to capture and convert microscopic particles and gas phase pollutants to prevent them from escaping from vehicles and into the environment,” said John Walker, sector chief executive, clean air at Johnson Matthey.

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NEWS MAKE A DIFFERENCE

TCI DEVELOPS ‘DEMONIC RED’ POWDER COATING

FOR FIAT CHRYSLER DODGE

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CI Powder Coatings developed a specially formulated “Demonic Red” colour for Fiat Chrysler Automobiles (FCA). FCA needed a colour that would meet the underbody and under-hood requirements as well as performance specifications to protect the valve covers and engine blocks of the Dodge Challenger SRT® Demon. With the support of the product development team, the development of the “demonic red” colour was prioritized and launched via the stage gate process. Through this process, TCI was able to quickly dedicate resources, prioritize the project and deliver on an expedited timeframe.

TCI was able to deliver on its promise of quick turnaround without sacrificing performance or quality. Currently, multiple fabricators and coaters are using the new product and have seen excellent results. The new product development lab is a strong facilitator in the specialty formulation process, helping it to meet styling demands of the automotive market, the company said.

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Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

STRATASYS SELECTED BY AIRBUS TO

3D PRINT JET PARTS

Additive manufacturing takes flight with 3D printed bracketing for the Airbus A350, manufactured by Stratasys Direct Manufacturing with FDM Technology and ULTEM 9085 resin.

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tratasys Direct Manufacturing, a subsidiary of Stratasys Ltd has been chosen by Airbus to produce 3D printed polymer parts for use on A350 XWB aircraft. Stratasys is one of the world’s largest 3D printing and advanced manufacturing service providers. The company will print non-structural parts such as brackets, and other parts used for system installation, on Stratasys FDM production 3D Printers using ULTEM 9085 material.

The project will help Airbus achieve greater supply chain flexibility and improve cost competitiveness while leveraging on reduced material consumption and waste.

Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

Stratasys Direct Manufacturing’s 3D printing capacity and infrastructure allow printing and shipping parts on demand to Airbus, bringing the expected reactivity, tighter turnaround times and lower inventory costs.

“We are proud to work with Airbus to continually advance 3D printing in aerospace applications. Our expertise in building parts ready for installation on the aircraft, along with our unique process controls and quality procedures, will allow Airbus to improve competitiveness leveraging on the technical benefits of 3D printing,” said Joe Allison, CEO of Stratasys Direct Manufacturing.

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NEWS ANALYSIS GST

IMPLICATIONS OF THE GST

IMPLEMENTATION

IN INDIA

BY DR JOERG STRASSBURGER

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he implementation of GST on the 1st of July is a very important reform for India and it will benefit the chemical industry in a significant way. This reform was long overdue, especially looking at the ambitions India has in becoming a global powerhouse in manufacturing with its’ “Make in India” initiative and not only wanting to be the leading service provider in the global IT industry. IWF is expecting an additional boost to the already well performing Indian economy.

The Indian chemical industry was waiting for a long time for this crucial reform. First discussions already started in the year 2000, but unfortunately the three previous governments were not pushing hard enough or did not have this reform high enough on their agenda. It is now a huge relief that finally the current government was able to overcome all hurdles and could win the opposition to support this important reform. And fortunately, in spite of the various discussion and critics

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Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

about the GST implementation on the 1st of July, it is important that the Finance Minister withstood the pressure and did not postpone the implementation to September. After years of postponement this clear message of the government wanting to get it done was important.

The benefits of this reform, especially in complex value chains like the one in the chemical industry, will be significant. Not only will the cascading effect of central and state levies, which could not be set off against each other, be avoided in most cases (exception is for example the Basic Customs Duty), but also logistics will be faster and distribution less costly because the number of local warehouses can be reduced and in the long run also border controls should disappear.

Another new and important aspect is that under the GST regime cross utilization of input taxes paid on goods and services would be allowed, thereby leading to tax cost savings on this count.

All together this means for the chemical industry that the cost basis will become more competitive and business processes can be made more efficient. This efficiency increase is also urgently needed because in several product groups the chemical industry was globally not very competitive in the last decade. In spite of a chemical market in India which grew along or in some segments even above GDP, the local production of chemicals stagnated or was only growing slowly. As per the data of the Ministry of Chemicals and Fertilizers, Government of India, the volume growth of the imported chemicals between FY 2006/07 and FY 2013/14 was 5 times higher than the growth of local production. Even if there was more than one reason which was the root cause to this negative development, it is evident that cost disadvantages played an important role as well. Especially for products at the end of a longer chemical value chain the efficiency increases should be sizable

because the multiple cost increases through the cascading tax effect and the addition of logistics and distribution, cost disadvantages will disappear. The exact benefits will still have to be seen, but surely this effect is one milestone on the way to reverse the trend in the Indian chemical industry that imports were growing much faster than local production.

The GST rates for chemicals are at reasonable levels with most products being in the 5, 12 and 18 percent bracket which is important as many products serve as intermediates in a longer value chain.

This avoids or at least reduces the risk that companies at the end of the value chain will generate more tax credit than they would be able to use. Contrary to for example the German tax system reimbursements of tax credits are not foreseen under GST except for special cases.

average for the members of the OECD and even below many emerging economies.

But will the implementation be smooth?

Good news is that the first 15 days after the implementation apparently passed without major problems. This is certainly also due to the effect that the government took the right decision to give some relaxation for the due dates for the monthly filling of invoices and purchases under the new system for the months of July and August.

But this also means we might only see in September how well the system really works.

Another important aspect of this reform is that the GST implementation will incentivize the unorganized sector to be part of main stream value chain. The new tax will require firms to upload their invoices every month to a portal that will match them with those of their suppliers or vendors. Because a tax number is needed for a firm to claim a credit on the cost of its inputs, many companies are refusing to buy from unregistered businesses. Those who don’t sign up risk losing any potential customer.

But it is clear already that at least the muchawaited removal of the border check-post will not happen fast as the consensus on the crucial e-way bill is still missing. Border check post for taxation were needed in the current indirect tax regime as VAT rates are different state by state. With one common rate in all of India the need for border check post did not exist. But as the GST laws requires that for goods worth more than Rs 50.000 an e-way bill has to be generated and has to accompany the invoice and these are not ready, checks will still be performed.

In this context the question remains why at all such an e-way bill is needed. In Europe goods are transported not only through different States but also through different countries without being stopped for checks in spite of having different tax rates in different countries.

This will for sure lead to a more compliant tax regime all over India. And it will also increase the number of tax payers and the tax income which is very important, as India currently has one of the worst taxto-GDP ratios among major economies at 16.6 percent, less than half the 34 percent

Another Challenge which will have to be managed is the input Tax credit on Transition. The transition provision in GST permits the carry forward of taxes paid under the current system into GST for certain eligible taxes and with certain limitations. In order to avail the full benefits

of the Input tax credits, the preparations need to be done before the ‘appointed date’.

As there are many conditions to be fulfilled and neither on the company side nor on the income tax side experience is available, It is foreseeable that it will not be a smooth process. Once this challenge is solved the next is already waiting to be managed: Input credits in the hand of recipient dealer is subject to satisfactory fillings of returns and payments of taxes by its suppliers. That means even if you paid taxes which were included in the bill to your supplier, you will not be able to claim credit if your supplier does not pay his taxes to the government, which unfortunately is not in your hand.

These points highlight as it weakness of the new GST system. It is a very complex set-up. There are for sure reasons for each and every complexity but wouldn’t it have been advisable to put efficiency as one of the top priorities on the agenda while doing such a huge reform? Does India really require 5 different GST tax rates (and even more if you include the different levels of Compensation Cess)? And why do companies have to make three tax declarations in India every month vs for example one in Germany?

But in spite of all these start up difficulties and weaknesses this set-up has, everybody in the industry should welcome this very crucial GST reform and should support a successful implementation wherever possible in order to make it a success. The new GST will make the Indian tax system less complex and the Indian manufacturing set-up more competitive. In a discussion about “Make or Import” it will certainly help to more often decide for “Make in India.”

Author:

Dr Joerg Strassburger is Founder and CEO of Go East Advisors GmbH.

Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

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EVENTS 06 - 08 September 2017

UPCOMING EVENTS

Chlor-Alkali Seminar (AMAI)

Location: Goa, India.

Organised by: Alkali Manufacturers Association of India Website: http://ama-india.org/events-list/ The two-day seminar on “New Development in O&M of Membrane Cell Plants with Energy Saving & Management in Chlor-Alkali Sector” will also have mini-exhibition, parallel networking opportunities and B2B meetings. Various subject experts, technology licensors, membrane suppliers, electrode coating suppliers, engineering consultants and eminent speakers from overseas countries and from within India will be making presentations. Some of the topics covered will be latest development in membrane cell process, cell house and electrolyser area, brine treatment area, utilities, HT power equipment, energy efficiency improvement, measures adopted to conserve energy and other resources, best energy management practices adopted by industry member units.

13 – 15 September 2017 FEICA

Location: Forte Village, Sardinia Italy Organised by: FEICA, the Association of the European Adhesive and Sealant Industry Website: http://www.feica-conferences.com/ The FEICA Conference and EXPO is firmly established as the premier event for Europe’s adhesive and sealant industry, providing essential insights into the key issues affecting the industry and great networking opportunities for formulators, customers and raw materials suppliers to discuss the latest trends and wider business environment.

14 – 15 September 2017 6th Speciality Films & Flexible Packaging

Location: Grand Hyatt Mumbai, India.

Organised by: Eliteplus Business Services Pvt Ltd Website: http://www.eliteplus.co.in/ The 6th Speciality films & flexible packaging global conference is a two day conference held at Mumbai. The conference will provide a knowledge platform to industry players, scientists, technologists & academicians in these segments from India and overseas.

18 – 20 September 2017 Industrial Gas Conference

Location: Jumeirah Beach Hotel, Dubai Organised by: Gasworld Conference Website: www.gasworld.com/conferences The Middle East & North Africa Industrial Gas Conference is a 3 day conference held at Dubai. The event brings together industry professionals to discuss, debate and network regarding the most current issues and innovations within the industrial gas market.

23 – 26 October 2017 KHIMIA

Location: Expocentre Fairgrounds, Moscow, Russia Organised by: Expocentre Moscow Website: http://www.chemistry-expo.ru/en/ KHIMIA 2017 International Exhibition for the Chemical Industry and Science showcases products from chemical technologies, research, new materials, commercial biotechnology in medical, pharmaceutical, food, paper, textile, agricultural and electric energy industries.

01 – 04 November 2017 Paperex

Location : Pragati Maidan, New Delhi, India Organised by: Indian Argo and Recycled Paper Mills Association.

Website : http://india.paperex-expo.com/Home Paperex is an internationally renowned series of exhibitions and conferences focusing on Paper, Pulp and all Allied Industries. It is the only comprehensive business platform serving the paper industry over the years.

28 – 30 November 2017 Cphi

Location: Bombay Exhibition Centre, Goregaon East, Mumbai Organised by: UBM EMEA Website: http://www.cphi.com/india/ The event focuses on the future of pharmaceutical equipment and machinery. The event highlights latest knowledge and trends in the industry. It is the best place for you to source quality machinery and equipment at competitive prices and to make career changing connections.

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Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

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LUBRICANTS SPECIALTY SILICONE

THE FUTURE OF SPECIALTY SILOXANE

COPOLYMER LUBRICANTS

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Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

BY CHAD CHICHESTER

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behind-the-scenes look at how Molykote® brand from The Dow Chemical Company is paving the way for innovations in high-temperature automotive and industrial appliance and maintenance applications.

The Molykote® brand from The Dow Chemical Company has been synonymous with cutting-edge technology in specialty silicone lubricants for nearly 70 years. In exploring the future needs of automotive and industrial appliance and maintenance markets, the company continuously works with design and maintenance engineer customers, providing solutions that push boundaries of science and technology to deliver lubrication performance, reliability and cost-savings. The launch of Molykote G-900x Series greases represents unprecedented innovation in silicone lubrication, opening up new opportunities and possibilities in the world of specialty, high-performance lubricants. This patented class of silicone lubricants was developed as a costattractive solution for extreme temperature, environment and speed requirements

High-Temperature Lubricity, Without Sacrifice

developed, having lower compressibility, for better load carrying.

Molykote G-900x Series greases, including G-9000 and G-9001, offer hightemperature lubricity without sacrificing low-temperature performance. Combining phenyl methyl and fluoro functional branches to a siloxane backbone, offers optimized thermal stability and wear resistance, in a copolymer used in Molykote G-900x greases, resulting in unique properties, including:

The idea behind the copolymer used in Molykote G-900x greases is to combine phenyl and fluoro functional groups on the same oxidatively stable silicone—SiO— polymer chain. This differs from blending a phenyl and flouro fluid. The copolymer creates one molecule combining the properties of phenyl and trifluoropropyl as a base fluid for lubricants.

• High thermal stability across a wide temperature range (-35 to 220 degrees Celsius) • Compatible with most plastics and elastomers •

Density of 1.4 g/cm3

•

Increased application lifetime due to high thermal and oxidative stability

•

Good corrosion resistance

•

Formulation capabilities with various thickener systems

A Behind-the-Scenes Look of Silicone Science In the 1960s, Dow Corning Corporation (now a wholly owned subsidiary of The Dow Chemical Company) developed phenyl methyl siloxane fluids, which exhibit very good low- and high-temperature performance properties, but lacked lubricious qualities and the ability to carry loads due to its flexible and compressible nature. In the 1970’s fluoro siloxanes were

Filling a Gap in the Marketplace Molykote G-900x Series greases are a costattractive solution for applications that do not require the ultimate high-temperature performance of perfluoropolyether (PFPE) greases and where ester-based lubricants are limited in temperature. Thinking about lubricant performance and application in a pyramid layout, most uses are accomplished with mineral oils at the bottom of the pyramid. At the top are PFPEs, which have fantastic performance attributes, but are costly and very specialized to applications that require highly oxidative and thermal properties. The Molykote G-900x Series copolymer fits within the middle space between traditional silicones and PFPEs. The copolymer also offers an advantage from a density perspective compared to PFPEs, providing nearly twice the volume for the same weight and lower specific gravity, resulting in better mobility, greater value and more lubrication from less material. It also enhances performance in applications where high-bearing speed or total mass are critical.

With improved acceptance for additives, such as anti-wear, anti-oxidation and extreme pressure, the product line allows expanded formulation flexibility compared to other silicone-based lubricants where additives are not soluble.

The Many Applications of Molykote brand products The Molykote G-900x Series greases are suitable for numerous high-temperature lubricant applications, including: •

High-temperature bearings

•

Tyre molding

•

Automotive powertrain components

• Carton board manufacturing equipment •

Metal processing

•

Injection molding equipment

•

Oil and gas

The Future of Specialty Lubricants The Molykote brand from The Dow Chemical Company has long been trusted worldwide for solving difficult lubrication challenges in reducing friction and wear.

We consider our line-up of base fluid technologies as a set of tools; the Molykote G-9000 Series greases is the latest tool in our quest for innovative new lubricants for high-temperature applications. We believe that this patented technology could very well change the way the industry thinks about specialty lubricants today and in the future.

Authors: Chad Chichester is Molykote® Lubricants Application Engineering Specialist from The Dow Chemical Company.

Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

17

SOLVENTS COMPONENT CLEANING

ENHANCING SAFETY, COST-EFFECTIVENESS

IN HIGH PRECISION COMPONENT CLEANING

H

ymatic Engineering Coy Ltd, part of Honeywell Aerospace, based in Redditch in the UK, specialises in the design, development and manufacture of cryogenic and fluid control systems, sub-systems, and precision engineered products for aerospace and defence applications.

A key part of Hymatic’s production process is the cleaning of manufactured component parts using solventbased vapour degreasing. Up until April 2016, the company had used trichloroethylene (TCE) as the solvent, but the EU now classifies TCE as potentially carcinogenic and has banned its use in degreasers.

As a result, Hymatic contacted Honeywell to investigate alternative and safer solvent options capable of providing equivalent cleaning performance.

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Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

The Needs • Hymatic needed an alternative solvent to TCE to meet exacting cleaning standards required for small electronic components destined for aerospace and defence applications.

• The solvent needed to be easy to handle with low levels of waste • Hymatic required a solvent with minimal impact on the environment both in usage and in disposal • The solvent needed to present a low risk to operative health

The Solution Having been contacted by Hymatic, Honeywell conducted desk and laboratory research into alternative solvents based on contaminant information provided by the company.

Solstice® Performance Fluid (PF) was recommended for field testing, based on its exceptional cleaning power, low environmental impact and significant workplace safety advantages over TCE. In addition, the new generation solvent had the potential to deliver cost savings through lower energy consumption. Solstice PF is non-flammable (according to ASTM E-681 testing), with a global warming potential (GWP) of 1, and an Occupational Exposure Limit (OEL) of 800 ppm. The Honeywell solvent has been designated as VOCexempt by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), is registered under the European Union’s REACH regulation and listed under the EPA’s Significant New Alternatives Policy (SNAP).

The Benefits • Ultra-precise Cleaning Performance: Low surface tension and high degree of solvency allows Solstice PF to deliver the ultra-precise cleaning performance in tight spaces required by Hymatic.

• Improved Energy Efficiency: Solstice PF’s much lower boiling point consumes 12kW less power annually and saving an estimated 6,000 euros in energy costs.

• Signficantly Enhanced Operator Safety: Solstice PF is non-toxic, has an OEL of 800

Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

ppm compared to 10 ppm for TCE, and has less onerous storage requirements than TCE. • Faster, More Efficent Cleaning: Solstice PF’s low boiling point of 19ºC – compared to TCE at 87.2ºC - means no need for cooling down periods • Waste Reduction: Solstice PF generates virtually no waste and its chemical structure means no degradation or acidification in service, unlike TCE • Cost Neutral: Total cost of ownership for Hymatic of the Solstice PF system is comparable to the TCE system, even at low throughput levels, leaving aside health and safety, and storage and handling benefits.

Hymatic – Implementing a safer, more efficient component cleaning process When EU regulations banned the use of TCE in precision cleaning in semiopen degreasers in April 2016, Hymatic needed a replacement solvent that would meet its cleaning requirements for its small electronic components, while ensuring as safe an operating environment as possible.

The company contacted Honeywell for advice on potential alternatives and, following detailed analysis of contaminants resulting from the manufacturing process, Solstice PF – a new generation fluorinated solvent offering exceptional cleaning power – was recommended for testing.

To enable Hymatic to validate the solvent performance, Honeywell provided a prototype degreasing unit, along with training both for the equipment and the use of Solstice PF, enabling the company to assess the performance of the solvent across the entire cleaning cycle.

In addition to the cleaning effectiveness, the company also assessed the relative cost factors associated with energy consumption, solvent storage, handling, disposal of empty drums and PPE arrangements for operator safety.

One immediate benefit was a reduction in the cleaning cycle period. With the new Solstice PF system, the vapour point (19ºC) was achieved in approximately 10 minutes from start-up, compared to

around one hour for TCE, which boils at 87.2ºC. This more energy efficient solution also translated into significant energy savings, with the Solstice PF system consuming 12kW less power annually (10kW compared to 22kW for TCE), using the same basket size – equivalent to around 6,000 euros a year.

Hymatic’s test and validation exercise proved the effectiveness of Solstice PF and the company has now adopted the solvent for its component degreasing process. The operating environment is safer; storage and handling requirements are simpler; and energy consumption for the degreaser unit has more than halved.

As a result of this change, the people at Hymatic now work in a safer and healthier environment and the overall cost of ownership looks set to reduce.

The Solstice® PF advantage Solstice PF’s ability to clean components at room temperature offers benefits in energy efficiency, operator safety and productivity even in low throughput manufacturing lines. Its low boiling point reduces overall cycle times by removing the need for component cooling periods.

The safety benefits are assured through Solstice PF’s nonflammability and its OEL of 800ppm – compared 10ppm for TCE – meaning less onerous personal protective equipment requirements for operatives during the cleaning process, and less costly and regulated storage and handling arrangements. The solvent’s ultra-low global warming potential also helps meet long-term environmental goals.

Solstice PF’s chemical structure means there is no degradation or acidification of the solvent when in service and, unlike TCE, it does not require regular checks or stabilization. Solstice PF can be distilled and recuperated within degreasers, any residual waste is easily removed, parts turn out without any need for cooling periods, with low fugitive solvent emissions, and the solvent is proven to clean tight spaces quickly and effectively.

Source: Honeywell International Inc.

19

CATALYSTS CATALYTIC SOLUTIONS

SAFEGUARDING FROM PERILS OF

INDUSTRIAL AND VEHICULAR POLLUTION

BY ARAVIND NARAYANAM AND M SHANMUGA SUNDARAM

T

he growing urbanization has made air pollution one of the larger killers and India cannot remain complacent.

The dynamic Indian economy continues to battle the rising level of pollution with air pollution being one of the greatest hindrances for development. The rising GDP and rapid industrial growth and increased emissions from industries along with vehicles is the main cause of pollution in the form of volatile organic hydrocarbons (VOC’s), lead/benzene, carbon monoxide, sulphur dioxide, nitrogen dioxide amongst other intoxicants.

India has witnessed an increase in concerns over environmental degradation in the last two years. According to a study published

by Earth System Science Data in 2015, India saw a growth of 5.2 per cent in emissions. As one of the key contributors to the ever-growing environmental issue, the government of India is taking various initiatives to curb the impact of pollution on the environment. Last year in October, India actively signed the Paris Climate Change Agreement and ensured reduction of carbon footprint and protect the earth from adverse impact of climate change.

Vehicular pollution also introduces harmful gases in the environment which has a destructive effect on the ecosystem. To lower the impact of vehicular pollution, the government introduced a ‘green tax’ of 2.5 per cent on small cars and 4 percent on

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Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

bigger cars and SUVs in the Union Budget 2016. Furthermore, all petrol and diesel vehicles that were more than 15 and 10 years old respectively were banned by NGT from plying on the roads in Delhi and NCR. In January 2016, the government announced that India will be skipping Bharat Stage V norms and enforcing Bharat Stage VI norms starting 2020, thereby addressing the key issue of vehicular pollution. The authorities have also clarified that no new BS-III registration of vehicles will be allowed post April 1 2017. This leap has obligated oil refining companies to invest in state-ofthe-art hydro-treating units to reduce the product sulfur from the current level of 50 ppm to 10 ppm.

In concurrence with the Government’s vision and initiatives to reduce carbon emission in the country, Sud-Chemie develops and manufactures catalysts which aids in cutting down on the toxic emissions from industrial & auto manufacturers. The company supports the chemical fraternity with innovative solutions which has helped transform human life in several ways. SudChemie India markets industrial catalysts for various chemical, petrochemical, refinery, automotive, specialty, fine and pharma applications. It produces catalysts in India for the Indian chemical industries and also exports these catalysts to several part of the world through its group company Clariant. Through its innovative solutions

and continuous research & development, Sud-Chemie has helped Indian industries to combat air pollution, thus assisting in their endeavour to make the world a better place to live in. In addition to development of several new catalysts at in-house R&D, Sud-Chemie in collaboration with National Chemical Laboratory, Pune has developed solid oxide catalyst for biodiesel technology that is now globally licensed by Benefuel Inc USA. Also, supported Indian Oil R&D in manufacturing a unique catalyst for INDAdept technology.

Hereunder is a short overview technology developed by Sud-Chemie that help produce low sulphur fuels and process other waste oil into a variety of environmentally benign products.

INDAdept: Gasoline & Diesel Sulfur removal technology: To meet the BS VI specifications, SudChemie in partnership with Indian Oil R&D has manufactured a proprietary adsorbent for reducing refractory sulfur from diesel called ‘INDAdeptD’ and total sulfur from cracked gasoline called ‘INDAdeptG’ for production of low sulfur fuels.

How does it work?

Through this, hydrogen consumption is significantly low since it is consumed only for saturation of olefinic bond generated by cleavage of the sulfur from the sulfur

compounds. A typical unit two fixed bed reactors are operated in swing mode of adsorption & regeneration. After reaching the breakthrough point, the adsorbent is regenerated with lean air by oxidation of adsorbed sulfur & coke followed by activation with hydrogen. INDAdeptD is particularly suitable as a finishing step after DHDS/DHDT for deep desulfurization of refractory sulfur from the diesel. During adsorption, hydro desulfurized diesel containing refractory sulfur of 350 to 500 ppm along with hydrogen is contacted with the proprietary adsorbent in a fixed bed reactor at 300 to 4000C & 15 to 30 bar. The existing DHDT unit can be operated at lower severity, just sufficient to meet the Cetane requirement, and further sulfur reduction can be achieved by employing INDAdeptD process. This helps in substantial saving (20-40 %) of precious hydrogen.

INDAdeptG process for gasoline desulphurization is similar to INDAdeptD but there are a few changes in operating range of parameters such as pressure, temperature, H2/HC ratio etc. The process is capable of processing full range cracked naphtha in single step. This process consumes lower hydrogen (0.15 to 0.25 wt percent of feed) with minimal octane loss of 1 to 2 units.

ENSEL Biodiesel technology & catalyst: ENSEL technology can process waste oils and lower-grade fats/oils into a variety of high margin products, including fuel, oleochemicals and biodegradable lubricants - a combined global market estimated at over one hundred billion dollars. Biodiesel produced from ENSEL technology can be blended with regular petroleum Diesel and reduce overall carbon footprint on the environment. In fact, blending of biodiesel or diesel from renewable sources is a mandatory requirement in some countries.

ENSEL technology has gone through five years of research and development and has been successfully proven at a demonstration scale. Commercial plant has been recently commissioned ENSEL process combines esterification of free fatty acids (FFA) and transesterification of triglycerides into a single process step – a long-standing technology goal of the biodiesel and oleochemical industries.

Solving these challenges significantly expands feedstock options, simplifies the refining process and enables a cost structure competitive with petroleum products. To achieve a consistent, high quality product, ENSEL process is engineered as a true continuous flow process (instead of a batch

Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

process), much like a commercial petroleum or petrochemical refinery. This affords lower CAPEX and OPEX on projects.

SulfoMax EV for reducing SO2 emission in Sulfuric acid plants Globally, Sulphuric acid is the largest manufactured chemical and is used in several chemical applications till date, the main application being the production of Phosphatic fertilizers that means a lot to the food industry catering to the ever-rising population.

SulfoMax series catalyst, a vanadium pentoxide compound, is used in the manufacturing of sulfuric acid. Continuous research by Sud-Chemie India resulted in a novel catalyst, SulfoMax EV (Environmental Version),that helps sulfuric acid producer reduce their SO2 emission to a greater extent. This novel catalyst with its ability to operate at quite lower temperature helps user to achieve higher equilibrium conversion and in turn, delivering lower SO2 emission on sustainable basis.

Lower the emission of SO2 sulphuric acid plants, lower is the emission of greenhouse gases (GHG’s) to atmosphere.

Diverse portfolio for Environmental Catalysts: Sud-Chemie’s catalysts are also used to clean emissions from industrial processes and combustion engines to limit the impact on the environment. For the treatment of Automobile, Stationery and Industrial Exhaust Gas, Sud Chemie offers the following range of catalytic solutions under the EnviCat® trade mark.

EnviCat® TWC: Three way catalysts (TWC) are used to simultaneously remove CO, HC and NOx from exhausts of spark ignited engines. The catalysts are designed to oxidize the CO and HC to harmless carbon dioxide and water and reduce the NOx to Nitrogen at the same time. Sud-Chemie offers a broad range of Catalytic converters for mobile & stationary engines fuelled by Gasoline, LPG & CNG.

(SOF) of diesel particulate matter.

Sud-Chemie catalysts are designed to provide the highest activity at low temperatures for CO and HC. For use with Sulphur containing fuels, the catalysts are formulated along with an additive to suppress the oxidation of sulphur dioxide to particulate sulphates. They can be offered on both metallic as well as ceramic substrates.

EnviCat® SCR: Selective Catalytic Reduction (SCR) is a robust and cost effective technology for reduction of NOx from diesel exhaust. The NOx reacts with NH3 and is reduced to nitrogen and water even in the presence of oxygen. SCR is widely accepted as the best available control technology. Engine tuned for SCR, NOxcontrol, offers high fuel efficiency.

Sud-Chemie offers a variety of innovative SCR catalysts to reduce NOx Emissions over a wide span of operating temperatures from 200°C to 600°C with proven durability.

Envicat® VOC Many industrial processes emit of volatile organic compounds (VOC) including the use and manufacture of solvents, the production of specialty chemicals, and fertilizer manufacture.

Compared to alternative technologies, catalytic oxidation technology offer low temperature operation, high conversion efficiency > 99 percent and less severe material of construction. It also offers lower capital cost and, low operating cost and consumes less fuel.

EnviCat® NOx: This range of catalysts have been developed for control of pollutants like NOx, and N2O from industrial sources. Below are the different well proven formulations that have been commercialized to cover the application specific requirements of temperature and sulfur resistance.

• EnviCat® Blue best at low temp but susceptible to sulfur poisoning

The use of high thermally durable wash coats and an automated state–of–the–art coating technology ensures long life of the catalyst. The superior thermal stability of the wash coat and use of improved oxygen storage materials permits the catalyst to be mounted closer to the engine for better cold start activity.

• EnviCat® Yellow best at intermediate temp and resistant to sulfur poisoning

EnviCat® DOC:

Selective oxidation catalyst for destruction of NH3 comes with a high selective conversion of NH3 to N2 conversion.

The diesel oxidation catalyst (DOC) is used to oxidize carbon monoxide, hydrocarbons, including the Soluble Organic Fraction

• EnviCat® Red best at higher temp. but poor low-temperature activity • EnviCat® N2O-S as a secondary catalyst in Nitric acid plants for removal of N2O

EnviCat® SCO:

Authors: Aravind Narayanam is Chief Manager, Marketing & Technical services and M Shanmuga Sundaram is Manager, Marketing & Technical services at Sud-Chemie India Pvt Ltd.

21

EXPERT VIEWPOINT PETROCHEMICALS

Datuk Sazal Hamzah, Managing Director & CEO, PETRONAS Chemicals Group (PCG), discusses the future of petrochemicals industry amidst volatile crude prices, challenging demand & supply relationship and touches upon sustainable practices.

INDUSTRY THAT PERVADES OUR LIVES – FROM GASOLINE TO

PLASTICS TO COSMETICS

BY SHIVANI MODY Trends in petrochemicals industry.

The petrochemicals market is thriving.

Rising global population and growing middle class affluence is expected to drive the demand for plastics, textiles, specialty chemical applications, automotives, healthcare, food and agricultural produce.

The industry will also be supported by strengthening global GDP growth of 2 to 4 percent for the next 5 years.

The petrochemical product prices have firmed up with stabilization of crude oil prices and improved demand. However, they are expected to remain volatile due to overcapacity, weak crude oil prices and naptha prices which will keep the markets for most petrochemical products such as – olefins, propylene, other ethylene derivatives, fertilizers, urea, ammonia and methanol – soft. It is, however, expected to gradually improve in mid and longer term.

When it comes to fertilizers, we anticipate the market to remain challenging in view of oversupply and weaker demand but is likely to improve after 2018. Meanwhile, methanol is also likely to strengthen following improving Brent crude price in the long run due to its increased usage in energy-based applications.

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Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

In summary, petrochemical industry will continue to grow and provide vast opportunities to add values.

Trends in specialty chemicals industry.

Specialty Chemicals is an attractive business. It is consistently growing where Total Shareholder Return (TSR) is recorded above market average. The Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of the chemical industry is 9.6 percent versus the average industry of 5 – 6 percent, making it an evolving market. Globally, consumption of specialty chemicals is expected to increase in volume at an average annual rate of nearly 3.5 percent during 2015 to 2020. Overall, the emerging markets offer more dynamic prospects for the specialty chemicals industry because of rising consumer-driven economies and industrialization.

In Asia, the top five growth specialty chemicals are specialty polymers, surfactants, electronics chemicals, food chemicals and catalysts. The global EBIT value pools for specialty and commodity is about 50:50, in the range of $200 billion each at present. It is anticipated that the growth will be double in the next 15 to 20 years.

Demands from specialty chemical users About 50 percent of the specialty chemicals consumption goes into four main end-use industries - cleaning and cosmetics; soap; food & beverages; electrical & electronics and construction. Other important enduse industries for specialty chemicals are motor vehicles, oil & gas mining, and paper & pulp.

As competition increases and mature products become commoditized in the specialty chemicals industry, the competitive advantage comes through offering tailor made applications and solutions to meet customer’s needs.

Oil & gas industry view As the world economy improves, the global demand for oil could surpass the 10-year average in 2017. OPEC expects demand to grow by 1.2 million barrels per day, up slightly from an earlier estimate of 1.0 million barrel per day. While vehicle sales are expected to increase in the US, Europe, China and India, OPEC is also expecting technological developments and increased regulations on fuel consumption.

These trends are expected to supplement growing global economic activities,

according to OPEC, which is forecasting a growth of 3.2 percent in 2017.

Strategy in challenging market dynamics.

All indicators point to another challenging year in 2017. The volatile crude oil price remains the biggest challenge. Although the global economy is expected to pick up, the increase is forecast to be slight, and demand for petrochemicals is likely to continue to be dwarfed by supply.

Within this environment, we remain optimistic by continuously offering added value products. Our strategic position in the center of Southeast Asia, one of the fastest growing regions in the world, as well as our world-class operational and commercial excellence, will stand us on a strong footing to face the soft environment.

We are focused at improving our world class plant and HSE performance at all our operations. We continuously implement internal reliability and efficiency enhancement programs, invest in technical capabilities of our people, and improve turnaround coordination across value chain. We will also maintain tighter controls to manage contractors, enhance strategic collaboration for improvement of feedstock and utilities supplies. We continue realizing higher value amidst a buyers’ market by looking at things from the customers’ lens. We have been able to offer compelling value propositions via commercial excellence ranging from innovative customized solutions to effective sales support in delivering the right customer experience. Moving forward, PCG’s strategy is to continue to strengthen its basic petrochemicals portfolio while selectively diversifying into derivatives, specialty chemicals and solutions.

This strategy for growth will increase PCG’s volume-play advantage as a competitive regional player whilst harnessing valueplay from higher margin products, which also enhances its resilience against market cyclicality and volatility. This ensures business sustainability in the long run by continuing to generate value and opportunities for society, and at the same time meet the need for petrochemical products in the health care, personal care, food, automobile and polymer packaging industries.

With this in mind, PCG has invested in five key projects with a total CAPEX of RM10.1 billion, which will add 5.1 million MTPA to the current nameplate capacity by 2020. The multiple growth projects lined up will add 49 percent capacity growth by 2019 to the business and will sustain PCG’s position as an important petrochemical player in the Asia Pacific region where we have a geographical advantage.

Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

We are continuously assessing key markets in Southeast Asia and Asia Pacific including Australia and New Zealand for any possible opportunities or enhancement of business presence.

Expansion plans for specialty chemicals PCG sees 0.2 percent of its total sales volumes coming from specialty chemicals but is aiming for 15 percent in the next 20 years.

PCG is interested to enter into the game by starting small with our portfolio of specialty chemicals through our growth projects with BASF PETRONAS Chemicals. These projects include: • The integrated aroma chemicals complex, tapping into the flavor and fragrance industry with the production of citral, citronellol and L-menthol which will come on stream in 2017.

• 2-EHAcid, a compound for the production of synthetic lubricants, oil additives, automotive coolants, paint dryers and plasticisers, successfully produced in 2016.

• HR-PIB, an intermediate product for the manufacturing of high performance fuel and lubricant additives, including additives for sludge prevention targeted to be on-stream in 2017.

We have recently announced FID on another specialty chemical, Isononanol (INA) from the petrochemical segment in Pengerang Integrated Complex (PIC) which will be ready by 2020. This additional volume of 250,000 MTPA will increase the specialty slate to 377,000 MTPA or 2 percent.

The next steps will be much more aggressive. We are currently conducting a comprehensive positioning study to develop a big picture master plan beyond 2020. We aspire to increase our volume up to 15 percent by 2037 to 2040.

Competing with global peers.

As a petrochemical company, PCG benchmarks itself with other top and leading petrochemical players in Asia Pacific, South East Asia and Middle East, and I must say we are pretty competitive.

With the execution of PCG growth projects, PCG will rise as a key player in Asia Pacific.

We are now the 4th largest methanol producer in the world and the second largest in Asia Pacific. SAMUR (Sabah Ammonia Urea project) propels us to be Southeast Asia’s 2nd largest urea producer.

And with our petrochemical projects in PIC coming on stream in 2019, PCG will become Southeast Asia’s largest MEG and polypropylene producer, and 2nd largest HDPE and Isononanol producer.

Maintaining energy efficiency for operations.

At PCG, we are aligned with the increasing global concern on climate change. Our energy consumption is closely linked with our greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.

More than 75 percent of our total GHG emissions originate from our fuel, steam and electricity consumption.

Our Energy Intensity and GHG Emissions Intensity improved in 2016 from 2015 due to better plant utilization and further supported by ongoing energy efficiency initiatives.

A success story in energy management recently has been seen at one of our plants, PETRONAS Chemicals Olefins (PC Olefins), which has significantly improved its energy efficiency by implementing initiatives to conserve fuel gas and steam since 2015. These energy management strategies have helped to reduce our energy consumption by 1,200,000 gigajoules (GJ) for 2016. It also reduced CO2 emissions by 81,000 tonnes, which is equivalent to removing 17,000 cars off the roads annually.

Developing biodegradable plastics and sustainable practices.

Currently, PCG does not have any plans to develop biodegradable plastic (BDP).

As mentioned earlier, we are studying opportunities in specialty chemicals and development of biodegradable plastics is a component of that study.

There has been significant progress in the last few years so if there is an opportunity for our business, we would like to be part of it. Most progress is being made producing biodegradable plastics from methane, rather than ethylene, which we use to make our polymers currently.

Nevertheless, PCG supports the government’s aspiration and showcases a strong commitment towards the environment, via inculcating the understanding of green and eco-friendly practices to its people and stakeholders through its 3Rs practice: Reduce, Reuse and Recycle. While PCG strive to preserve the environment via 3R practices, and by increasing awareness amongst stakeholders, both internal and external, on the responsible usage of our products to minimize the impact on environment.

Beyond that, PCG also supports plastic development program for sustainability like better plastic packaging to preserve food and reduce waste, ensuring product safety to avoid hazardous chemical and product life cycle / carbon foot print analysis

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EXPERT VIEWPOINT ADHESIVES & SEALANTS Shilip Kumar, Country President – India, Henkel Adhesive Technologies India Pvt Ltd delves into the ways in which adhesives & sealants solutions are fast becoming an integral part of any and every end-product. He also points out the need to increase consumer awareness for these solutions.

HIGH-IMPACT SOLUTIONS FOR

IMPROVED PRODUCTS & PROCESSES

BY DEBARATI DAS

Global trends in the adhesives & sealants segments.

Trends and developments in both segments are closely related to three major global megatrends: • Urbanization and population growth • Alternative energies and sustainability • Mobility and communication The Adhesive Technologies business unit of Henkel is benefitting from these megatrends by offering high-impact solutions to several customers globally enabling new products, making existing products better and improving processes. Today, adhesives and sealants are an integral part in numerous applications and nearly all end-products across diverse markets. Some examples of our solutions include: - Lightweight solutions for the automotive industry and the aerospace market - Solution that exploits lubricant-cleaner synergies to reduce costs, boost performance, save energy, lower waste generation and improve working conditions - Solutions for advanced driving assistance systems and e-Mobility in cars - Packaging/flexible packaging solutions that ensure food safety - Solutions for electronic devices enabling added functionalities; eg, for smartphones - New high-performing products for consumers and craftsmen.

Key drivers for adhesives & sealants market in India.

Packaging, automotive, construction, and furniture industries are the major drivers of the adhesive and sealant industry in India.

The FMCG sector, especially the food industry, which predominantly uses flexible packaging and paper packaging solutions, is experiencing a surge in demand. The demand in this sector is expected to grow significantly due to the above normal rainfall this year. Moreover, reduction in interest rates during the

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Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

first quarter of 2017-18 has led to an increase in the disposable income of consumers, which is likely to add to the demand.

The need for better quality products in the construction sector has also increased considerably due to Government initiatives such as Smart city, IT corridors, Food mega parks, etc.

High growth of adhesives and sealants is being seen in agriculture and construction equipment and appliances, white goods and filters —water filters, oil filters and high-efficiency particulate air filters. With awareness about adhesives increasing, the demand for Do-it-Yourself (DIY) segment is also growing rapidly in India.

Adhesives & sealants requirements in the automotive industry.

All vehicle manufacturers aim to build the perfect body in white (BIW). It is the basis of a premium quality, light-weight car, for example. Henkel‘s comprehensive product line simplifies complex processes and helps design smart, multi-substrate BIW vehicle structures along the value chain. Body and paint shop processes are more efficient with our state-of-the-art cleaning, forming, cutting, joining, bonding, glazing, vibration damping, seam sealing, automotive sound deadening & pre-paint surface treatments. The challenges are numerous whilst designing and assembling a vehicle: bonding, cleaning, reinforcing, fastening, laminating, acoustics and sound insulation are just a few areas that need attention.

At Henkel, we work with automotive manufacturers to develop a variety of innovative automotive body shop products that enable weight reduction, economy of assembly and efficient use of floor space. A car paint shop faces multiple challenges: from cleaning to acoustics and sound insulation, and from coating to glazing. Our cleaners prepare the vehicle. Next, a variety of challenges can be tackled with multi-substrate conversion coatings, anti-corrosion coatings and the next generation of paint sealants. Easily applied NVH (Noise, Vibration and Harshness) materials like liquid sound deadeners (LASD) and high dampening foams (HDF) result in significantly reduced noise and vibration. Some of the new trends in this area are bonding to oily metal, high temperature compatibility during paint bake cycles, reduced cure cycles and higher reliability.

Requirements in developed vs emerging markets.

General requirements for both the developed and the emerging markets are similar. Depending on the industry sector and the specific solution, adhesives and sealants need to provide benefits to our customers. These benefits can be increased sustainability, higher performance, increased cost-competitiveness or new design opportunities, among others.

A key differentiating factor between the developed and the emerging markets is the growth opportunities in latter. The growing middle class and urbanization in the emerging market, especially in Asia and IMEA, is increasing demand for adhesives and sealants in these markets.

We benefit from our global reach and proximity to the technical design centers and manufacturing hubs of major customers in different industries. By moving innovation capabilities and production sites close to our growing customer base in emerging markets, we have been able to provide local solutions while leveraging global technologies and expertise.

Adhesive & sealants business for the company in India India holds a strategic position for Henkel as a part of the company’s long term growth strategy both as a domestic market and a base to serve the other international markets. Our biggest focus areas are strengthening Henkel India’s manufacturing and innovation footprints in the country as well enhancing product development resources. We have already made an investment of $36 million to set up the first phase of India’s largest adhesive manufacturing unit at Kurkumbh near Pune. We have also set up a flexible packaging academy at Thane and an innovation center at Pune.

Our Flexible Packaging Academy in Mumbai provides training based on the principle of ‘Learning by Doing’. The training program, conducted in collaboration with Indian Institute of Packaging (IIP), combines essential theoretical knowledge and handson practical training. This state-of-the-art academy provides IIP certified training on lamination technology to entrepreneurs, production managers, supervisors, operators, quality control personnel and other professionals of the flexible packaging industry in the India, Middle East and Africa (IMEA) region.

We are a specialty material company, and innovation has been the key driver for our growth. In India too we follow the same

Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

approach. Our innovation center at Pune was set up with the aim to develop products for various adhesive technologies across multiple industrial applications. Here, our teams work closely with the customers to understand their requirements and develop the products accordingly. I am delighted to share that we have been able to develop cost effective solutions for many of our customers. At present, we have a core team of 50 engineers and scientists at the innovation center. Few examples of recent innovations from this center, which includes global launches: - PC 7000 – High temperature abrasion resistance silica composite systems for coal burner tip application (patented) - Cyanoacrylate hybrid structural adhesives - Loctite HY 4090, HY 4070 for plastics, metal bonding, quick fixture time and excellent reliability (Patented) - Loctite PC 7383 - High impact, high abrasion resistant coating for mining industry that helps reduce downtime of the worn-out equipment We have also recently inaugurated an acoustic lab and an MRO (Maintenance, Repair & Overhaul) Center of Excellence.

The MRO center focuses on increasing reliability and efficiency of its customers.

The acoustic lab has an anechoic and reverberation chamber. It facilitates vehicle, appliance and component level testing for different applications as per international standards. It also helps meet high level product validation tests.

We offer chemical sealing solutions for various industrial equipment; viz, pumps, engines, gensets and chemical processing equipment, to name a few. Typically, mechanical fastenings such as nuts and bolts are used by the industrial equipment manufacturers, which we feel can be replaced with adhesives that are highly effective and can perform very well under extreme conditions. This is one of the examples of disruptive innovations that are going to set new market trends and open a lot of avenues in the future.

Areas of improvement for the adhesives & sealants segment in India.

When we talk of market, it means both the existing conventional market as well as the untapped market, which can be tapped into with innovative sealing solutions that can replace the existing technologies. The challenge here is to translate potential markets into actual markets. Replacing the mechanical fastenings with liquid sealants, is just one such example. We see India as a high potential market, and as

market leaders we intend to take on the challenge of converting the latent potential into actual market. As a company, we are determined to grow double digit every year creating opportunities in the markets by providing new innovative solutions that cut across different industry verticals.

The market driver in consumer durables, white goods, and vehicles is the increased importance being given to reliability, better aesthetic, lighter weight, comfort, fuel efficiency, increased functionality, etc. To meet this market driver, the use of composites and plastics in assemblies across white goods, specialty vehicles and construction equipment is increasing.

Structural adhesives offer many advantages over conventional joining technology.

These advantages include joining dissimilar substrates, plastics, composites, etc.; corrosion resistance; and higher reliability; among others. In India, awareness on using structural adhesive is limited; hence, the market has not yet fully developed.

To convert non-users to users, awareness needs to be created through educational seminars, trade shows, promotions, white papers/ articles on technological benefits in magazines and other relevant publications.

Challenges faced by adhesives & sealants manufacturers Globally, regulations are getting stricter, and are changing more frequently as consumer awareness on safety, health and the environment is increasing by the day.

Globalization is a new factor affecting countless industries in an ever-smaller world, whilst mergers and acquisitions are becoming more frequent, having an effect not only on those directly involved, but across whole markets.

In India, adhesive and sealant manufacturers are faced with increasing raw material prices due to shortages.

Another challenge is that between a less expensive but harmful product and a little expensive yet safe and sustainable product, some end-users opt for the cheaper option.

Some examples of this are: - House owners do not insist on VOCfree products while getting furniture made / purchasing furniture, as it increases the total expense by 15 to 20 percent.

- Being hard pressed for time, some flexible laminate manufacturers do not wait for the adhesives to cure, which could result in PAA (Primary Aromatic Amines) migrating in to food being packed.

This also points to the lack of awareness among various stakeholders across the ecosystem on the importance of using safe and sustainable products.

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EXPERT VIEWPOINT PIGMENTS

Ravi Kapoor, Managing Director, Heubach Colour Pvt Ltd, talks at length about the opportunities of the pigments industry and he opines that although the requirement of all the customers are similar, the winner however is the one who makes the product better, stronger, cleaner and cheaper, in a responsible and sustainable manner.

THE FUTURE OF THE INDUSTRY IS BRIGHT;

IT IS UP TO US TO MAKE IT SHINE

BY SHIVANI MODY Industry trends in pigments.

The pigment industry globally grows at around 3-4 percent and obviously in the developing world due to the lower consumption base, the consumption growth is much higher. Pigments are fully linked to the economic development and growth of the world and a country. Today, 80 percent of pigments are produced in China and India. With regards to consumption of pigments, Asia consumes around 40% of the world’s pigments. This shows a clear shift from the west to the east both in production and consumption but more so in production.

Regarding the trend of the industry, China is a clear dominant player both in manufacturing and supply of intermediates for pigment production as well as the pigment itself. However India also made serious in-roads and currently competes hard with China. We also need to differentiate within the pigments itself

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Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

as the white and black pigments needs to be categorized separately and the coloured pigments can be divided into organic and in-organic. In the organic pigments domain, India is a dominant player in the green and blue pigment and China is a clear force in the yellow and red. The reason mainly clear here is that the intermediates for the green and blue are available in India whereas for the red and yellow a lot of the intermediates needs to be imported from China.

The Chinese strategy has been to create mega capacities and beat out the competition with the share volume game. This resulted in the exit of main Indian intermediate manufacturers who are simply unable to compete. This has been the story for the last 8-10 years and the Indian producers are dependent on the Chinese intermediate producers for key intermediate for the yellow and red manufacturing.

However there are some changes being observed now and the cost of manufacturing in China has slowly but surely increased over the past years and we are now in a situation where the Indian intermediate producers may now come back into the game. In short, Chinese intermediates + duties are simply becoming more expensive and the Indians are back with the chance, especially for domestic consumptions. The Chinese, however, still dominate in the napthol intermediates among other areas but there is a sense of balance coming in.

Another interesting development is that the Chinese government, keeping in mind the waste prone nature of intermediates and pigment production, nudges their producers to sell in the domestic market as they prefer value addition on waste generating prone products. They prefer to go up the value chain as far as possible.

All this has presented opportunities to the Indian pigment industry to gear up and

increase their global market share. As far as India is concerned the growth of the pigment industry has emanated originally from the textile industry with knowhow coming in from Europe.

Electronic display technology (LCD, OLED & PDP displays, Optical Devices) and Optical Information storage (CD & DVD) are growing with a double digit compared to conventional applications.

Over the years the industry has developed into all the other applications i.e. paints, inks and plastics. This is also due to the fact that India itself has a huge domestic market and of course the global market is always attractive.

With a growing demand of electronic gadgets, the demand for the display units are also increasing and thus giving growth to the organic pigment consumption in this field. The evolution in the technology and demand from the customers for better display properties with lower power consumption has led to the latest development in the pigment structure and search for newer molecules. This trend is expected to continue.

Trends in various application areas of pigments.

Pigments have been traditionally sold in Ink (application share 50 percent), Paint (25 percent) and Plastic (15 percent) segments while rest of the applications hold 10 percent share. While ink segment dominates the consumption of pigments, it is mainly responsible for the high volume, low value or relatively commodity pigments. The market is growing in India, however globally there is certain unease due to the introduction of the e-readers and a growing trend to move to the digital world. India still continues to grow with a huge market in newspaper and other inks.

The growth rate in this segment is 6-8 percent. The entry barriers are the lowest in the ink application and it is mainly a price driven market. The paint industry in India has grown by leaps and bounds.

Latest development in organic pigments.

Today’s colour trends are being driven by various influences including culture, technology, environmental issues etc. The “green� movement is another area that is having a huge impact and the eco agenda are very visible at the world pigment sector and it is clear that both scientific and commercial minds are focused on delivering products with stronger environmental credentials.

The latest developments in the organic pigment industry are focussed on the particle size optimization, surface modification and to produce pigments that can be readily dispersed without any loss of performance characteristics.

Growing consumption of plastics in the packaging & food industry is demanding eco-friendly pigments and ink sector is pushing development for high chroma nano pigments for inkjet applications.

Growing use of organic pigments in hi-tech applications.

Specialty and knowledge based colourants, which are providing solutions to Imaging and Information technology applications such as Digital printing and Imaging,

Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

Factors limiting the growth of organic pigments in India.

Pigments are a difficult segment to produce as not only are the chemistries complicated but generally the processes are not very waste management efficient. In addition, the need for global size, already existing over capacities in some cases, need to backward integrate from feedstock to the key intermediates where again global size viable capacities are required, it is a complex issue. India is a major producer in the green and blue pigments as also the largest exporter for the global requirement.

China prefers to value add and selfconsume in this colour space. However in bigger volumes like yellow and red pigments, China dominates with a full strategy of backward integration into the intermediates. India lacks in this colour space as it relies on Chinese imports to a large extent.

For India to grow, the most important requirement is to produce responsibly in a clean and sustainable manner, else the growth will be hampered. MSMEs are producing and selling but many live constantly under the fear of closures by authorities for non compliance of environmental regulations. Sometimes the scale does not allow investments to address these issues. Newer and cheaper technologies need to be developed and process improvement to minimize waste needs to be done. Certain level of consolidation is required and inevitable but again many of the plants are not in the best of shape so some levels of closures are likely.

For a more systematic growth there has to be a high level of understanding of the requirement and clear plan of creating a value chain from feedstock to intermediate to final product at a global scale. This needs to be integrated into the cluster concept via a PCPIR specifically for catering to the pigment and dyes industry. There are

intermediate companies doing very well but even they require the volumes to get into certain intermediates and the volumes are not there as the Indians are not competitive in certain pigments. It is a classic egg or hen situation and the nordic knot has to be untied. In the meanwhile India will grow though in fits and starts with the Damocles Sword of pollution authorities hanging on the head of the pigment industry.

Journey of the company in India and future plans.

Heubach India produces organic pigments in India and is a global player offering a comprehensive product mix. Heubach Germany is market leader in the inorganic pigment space and amongst the top anti corrosive pigments producers in the world.

These products do not yet have a big market in India and the developing world but this will soon come. Heubach India will grow in the organic pigments with a large increase in capacity, enter into new product space and gear up to set inorganic pigments plants as the best technology and the market penetration is already available.

Growth strategy in Asia Pacific.

Asia Pacific region is very diverse, and its political, market and legal systems, populations and customer bases are vastly different from the other parts of the world.

Developing Asia is predicted to contribute 60 percent of world growth in coming years. Most subregions will see growth slow, however with GDP across the region is expanding by 5-7 percent in 2016 and 2017.

Heubach Group has substantial business in the region with increasing market share.

We provide full colour solutions to the customers by bringing Inorganic pigments range from our Germany plant and Organic pigments from Indian plant. We plan to further consolidate our positon by opening regional office and tech service lab.

As president of the Indian Chemical Council (ICC) - message for the chemical fraternity.

The chemical industry can, should and will grow prolifically in the coming years.

The only question is how fast and how sustainable. I am convinced that the fastest and most consistent growth would come under the responsible care umbrella.

Our industry needs to embrace this whole heartedly, our accidents in plant in transportation needs to reduce, the safety and health of all stake holders should be a top priority, process safety and optimization a key to existing and new projects, waste minimization and management a must.

The future of the industry is bright; it is up to us to make it shine.

To read the full interview, log on to http://www.worldofchemicals.com/media/ interviews/management

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GREEN CHEMISTRY

NEW ECO-FRIENDLY COATING FOR BOATS FROM SHELLFISH WASTE

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esearchers from the GREEN-CHEM network at Ghent University have developed a new coating for boats based on the recycled waste from shellfish. The classic anti-fouling coatings battle the growth of mussels, sea cubes, algae and other sea creatures with toxic substances like heavy metals. However, this new coating is environmentally friendly. The eco-friendly coating will be immediately put to the test during a sailing trip around the world.

Schrimp

T

he protecting layer mainly consist of chitosan, a biological component made from the waste of shellfish, animals like lobsters, crabs, scampi’s and shrimp.

That substance naturally works as a protection from moulds and bacteria.

It is now already used in agriculture, water purification, the food industry and cosmetic industry to suppress body odor and for medical applications.

Professor Chris Stevens from the faculty of bio-science engineering at Ghent University and his team have modified the material in a way it got an extra protective function.

It should now be able to keep mussels, sea cubes, algae and other sea creatures from growing on the hull of the sailing boat.

“To stop that kind of fouling, toxic substances are generally used. We accepted the challenge to do this in a more biological way without risk for the environment,” explained professor Stevens. “Besides, we have managed to convert food waste in to something useful, causing a very low ecological footprint of the product.”

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Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

Sailing trip around the world The special coating can soon be tested in the water. It has been applied on the hull of the sailing boat of sailor Erik Kiekens, who is departing in the summer of 2017 on a sailing trip around the world under the name ‘Sailing Le Grand Bleu’.

During that trip, the chitosan-derivate will have to prove it is protective enough against the growth of mussels, sea cubes, moulds and bacteria.

Kiekens is an old-chemist himself and has been doing research on anti-fouling paints for many years. However, until now those contained toxic substances. And that is one of the reasons he is going to test the product from Ghent University, next to his own product, solely based on natural ingredients. Also with Hasselt University and the University of Leuven he has started a cooperation to use nanotechnology in this application.

International Green Chemistry Network

The coating from the researchers is a new step towards the kind of research Ghent University wants to aim for in the new global network of Green Chemistry, called GREEN-CHEM, towards small footprint solutions. The aim of the network is to design chemical products and processes to reduce the usage of dangerous substances or even make their use completely unnecessary.

This network combines the expertise of chemists from universities from all over the world: York (UK), Toulouse (France), Sao Paulo (Brazil), Maastricht (The Netherlands), Tennessee (US), Sichuan (China), Hong Kong (China), Karlsruhe (Germany) and Zürich (Switzerland). The coordination of the international network will happen in Ghent.

The goal of the network is to deliver education, research and services about sustainable & green chemistry to companies all over the world. With the central theme with of how to apply green technology in production and design processes.

INORGANIC BIOMATERIALS FOR SOFT-TISSUE ADHESION

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esearchers at Okayama University describe in Acta Biomaterialia a new type of biocompatible adhesive material.

The adhesive, made from nanoparticles of hydroxyapatite, glues both synthetic hydrogels and mouse soft tissue, providing a promising alternative to organic materials currently in use for clinical applications.

As an alternative to surgical stitching with suture, the practice of using adhesive organic materials for joining soft tissue has been around for decades. However, the currently used clinical adhesives often suffer from limited biocompatibility and/or sub-optimal adhesive strength.

A team of researchers led by Takuya Matsumoto from Okayama University and colleagues has now identified a class of biocompatible–biodegradable compounds showing promising adhesion properties when applied to mouse soft tissues. The scientists relied on the recent discovery that certain nanostructured materials display

remarkable adhesiveness. For example, introducing a dispersion of silicon oxide nanoparticles between two hydrogels results in rapid adhesion of the hydrogels — an effect now developed further for industrial, non-clinical applications. In order to achieve the level of biocompatibility required for clinical usage, Matsumoto and colleagues experimented with nanoparticles of hydroxyapatite (HAp), an inorganic material found in human hard tissues such as bones and teeth. HAp-composites are routinely used for orthopedic and dental implants, as well as in tissue engineering.

The researchers reckoned that dispersions of nanoparticulate HAp should behave as biocompatible adhesives — an idea they were able to confirm experimentally.

Matsumoto and colleagues first examined the effect of HAp-nanoparticle dispersions on the adhesion of synthetic hydrogels; the presence of HAp clearly enhanced the level of adhesion. Drying the dispersions

— resulting in solid HAp ‘plates’ — increased the cohesion between the HAp nanoparticles, and using the plates as the adhesive agent then led to even better interhydrogel adhesion. The scientists then tested the HAp plates on different mouse soft tissues: muscle, lung, kidney and other tissues could be successfully glued together.

An adhesion strength at least twice as large as obtained with a commercial organic glue was observed for mouse skin tissues.

The findings of Matsumoto and colleagues are not only relevant for developing new procedures for surgical-wound healing, but also for drug-delivery technologies — the potential of hydrogels as drug containers has long been recognized. In the words of the researchers: “Our results will help not only in developing an efficient approach to close incised soft tissues, but also in finding novel ways to integrate soft tissues with synthetic hydrogels (such as drug reservoirs).”

Dispersions containing hydroxyapatite (HAp)

nanoparticles, dried and made into plates have

outstanding adhesive properties, and are

biocompatible and bio-

degradable.

Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

29

GREEN CHEMISTRY

IMPROVED SUSTAINABLE METHOD TO REFINE METALS

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ew method could reduce environmental impact of extracting metals from raw materials and post-consumer electronics.

A more sustainable way to refine metals

A

team of chemists in Canada has developed a way to process metals without using toxic solvents and reagents.

The system, which also consumes far less energy than conventional techniques, could greatly shrink the environmental impact of producing metals from raw materials or from post-consumer electronics.

“At a time when natural deposits of metals are on the decline, there is a great deal of interest in improving the efficiency of metal refinement and recycling, but few disruptive technologies are being put forth,” said Jean-Philip Lumb, an associate professor in McGill University’s department of chemistry. “That’s what makes our advance so important.

The discovery stems from a collaboration between Lumb and Tomislav Friscic at McGill in Montreal, and Kim Baines of Western University in London, Ont. In an article published in Science Advances, the researchers outline an approach that uses organic molecules, instead of chlorine and hydrochloric acid, to help purify germanium, a metal used widely in electronic devices. Laboratory experiments by the researchers have shown that the same technique can be used with other metals, including zinc, copper, manganese and cobalt. The research could mark an important milestone for the “green

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Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

chemistry” movement. “Applications of green chemistry lag far behind in the area of metals,” Lumb said. “Yet metals are just as important for sustainability as any organic compound. For example, electronic devices require numerous metals to function.”

Taking a page from biology There is no single ore rich in germanium, so it is generally obtained from mining operations as a minor component in a mixture with many other materials.

Through a series of processes, that blend of matter can be reduced to germanium and zinc.

“Currently, in order to isolate germanium from zinc, it’s a pretty nasty process,” Baines explained. The new approach developed by the McGill and Western chemists “Enables you to get germanium from zinc, without those nasty processes.” To accomplish this, the researchers took a page from biology. Lumb’s lab for years has conducted research into the chemistry of melanin, the molecule in human tissue that gives skin and hair their colour. Melanin also has the ability to bind to metals. “We asked the question: ‘Here’s this biomaterial with exquisite function, would it be possible to use it as a blueprint for new, more efficient technologies?’” The scientists teamed up to synthesize a molecule that mimics some

of the qualities of melanin. In particular, this “organic co-factor” acts as a mediator that helps to extract germanium at room temperature, without using solvents.

Next step: Industrial Scale The system also taps into Friscic’s expertise in mechanochemistry, an emerging branch of chemistry that relies on mechanical force – rather than solvents and heat – to promote chemical reactions. Milling jars containing stainless-steel balls are shaken at high speeds to help purify the metal.

“This shows how collaborations naturally can lead to sustainability-oriented innovation,” Friscic said. “Combining elegant new chemistry with solventfree mechanochemical techniques led us to a process that is cleaner by virtue of circumventing chlorine-based processing, but also eliminates the generation of toxic solvent waste.”

The next step in developing the technology will be to show that it can be deployed economically on industrial scales, for a range of metals.

“The platform works on many different kinds of metals and metal oxides, and we think that it could become a technology adopted by industry. We are looking for stakeholders with whom we can partner to move this technology forward,” Lumb said.

A MORE SUSTAINABLE PROCESS FOR METAL EXTRACTION

A

team of chemists from McGill University in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, and Western University in London, Ontario, Canada, have developed a way to process metals without toxic solvents and reagents. Their innovation could help reduce negative environmental impacts of metal extraction from raw materials and electronic scrap. As reported by McGill, “The system, which also consumes far less energy than conventional techniques, could greatly shrink the environmental impact of producing metals from raw materials or from post-consumer electronics.

In an article published in Science Advances,

Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

the researchers outline an approach that uses organic molecules, instead of chlorine and hydrochloric acid, to help purify germanium, a metal used widely in electronic devices. Laboratory experiments by the researchers have shown that the same technique can be used with other metals, including zinc, copper, manganese and cobalt.”

The development is an interesting example of biomimicry. Germanium is a semiconductor not found in substantial quantities in any one type of ore, so a series of processes are used to reduce mined materials with small quantities of the

metal to a mixture of germanium and zinc.

Isolation of germanium from the zinc in this resulting mixture involves what one of the researchers called “nasty processes.”

For an alternative less dependent upon toxic materials and energy use, the researchers found inspiration in melanin, the pigment molecule present in skin, hair, and irises of humans and other animals. Besides contribution to coloration, melanin can bind to metals. The researchers synthesized a molecule that mimics some of melanin’s metal-binding qualities. Using it they were able to isolate germanium from zinc at room temperature, without solvents.

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COATINGS SPECIAL INDUSTRIAL COATINGS

ONE COAT - MULTIPLE

FUNCTIONALITIES

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he global coatings industry is striving to provide more - environment protection, corrosion resistance, weather durability, gloss and shine….. all in just a single coat.

BY DEBARATI DAS

W

e know that the main purpose of coatings is that of beautification and protection- but that’s just the leading edge.

Industrial coatings industry constantly has to keep up with new materials getting incorporated in various industries, evolving applications of existing materials, ever changing environmental laws, and much much more. In short, a coating which was perfectly suitable last year can be redundant today because a certain industry switched from metal to plastic. The coatings manufacturers have to constantly innovate to keep it attuned to the changes in the industry. Industrial coatings have to be versatile enough to perform on complex substrates and be robust enough for surfaces made of multiple mixed metals, plastics and other materials. Although the growth of this market has had several drivers, currently the industry dynamics is majorly being driven by the environmental concerns. The coatings industry is one of

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Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

the most heavily regulated industries today.

Most countries are constantly changing their environmental norms for a safer and better environment. While the US and Europe observes stringent environmental norms, emerging markets like China and India are also weaving its policies and norms to guard the rising environmental concerns. Coatings industry too is changing to make its products environment friendly.

There is an increasing demand for lowsolvent and solventless technologies with low volatile organic compounds (VOCs) and hazardous air pollutants (HAPs).

New coating technologies are constantly entering the market and the user industry has a plethora of choices for new coating technologies including waterborne (thermosetting emulsion, colloidal dispersion, water-soluble) coatings, highsolids coatings, two-component systems, powder coatings, UV curables, radiationcurable coatings etc. These coatings

reportedly have good growth prospects in the future. Furthermore, the coatings industry being one of the large consumers of solvents, which are mostly derived from petrochemical feedstocks and refinery operations, the industry is also bending towards bio-based coatings to minimize the dependence on petrochemicals.

“From corrosion and fire protection to scratch resistance, aesthetic purposes or improved appearance, the tasks in industrial coatings are increasing. In paint application we see a high demand for automation.

In many industries, nearly all processes are already automated. Painting is often still a manual process,” said Alexander Carls, manager product management, (application technology/industrial products), Durr Systems AG. “We also see the trend for ease-of-use solutions together with robustness.

Asia-Pacific is expected to witness the fastest growth in this segment owing to surging industrialization coupled with rising automotive industry in various countries including India and China.

Even though there are numerous coatings producers in the market, the industry largely has an oligopoly of over 10 multinationals who are now expanding their operations in fast-growing markets such as China and India.

Karan Chechi, Research Director, TechSci Research.

“Additionally, increasing government initiatives to accelerate the flow of FDI in countries like China and India is projected to steer the demand of industrial coatings in the region. The region holds a revenue share of more than 40 percent in the industrial coatings market in 2017,” said Chechi.

Both factors are often crucial for customers decision on a product, as well experienced technicians to maintain and setup coating products / processes are rare and therefore expensive,” he added.

Apart from this, demand for industrial coating is also expected to come from countries such as Brazil, South Africa, Spain and France.

Demographic outreach According to TechSci Research, the global industrial coatings market stood at $74.35 billion in 2016. The market is expected to grow by 4.01 percent to reach $77.33 billion by the end of 2017. “Rising automotive productions in conjunction with intensifying usage of corrosion coatings in various industries are the prime factors, pushing the demand for industrial coating across the globe. During 20172021, the demand for industrial coating is anticipated to increase with a CAGR of 5.15 percent to reach to $94.54 billion by 2021,” said Karan Chechi, research director, TechSci Research.

The coatings industry in the US, Western Europe and Japan are the mature markets and largely dependent on the growth of automotive, construction and transportation industry which too are currently witnessing slow growth. The action however, is happening in the East where China, India, Iran, Poland and Saudi Arabia will offer the best growth prospect for the industry.

“The major demand is from Asia-Pacific and is also forecasted to grow at the highest CAGR. The growing demand from the enduser industries such as automotive, general industrial, coil, and others especially from the countries such as India, China, and Vietnam is expected to drive the industrial coatings market. Though the demand of industrial coatings is less in Vietnam, but is expected to increase due to the potential and the untapped markets in the country,” said Annirban Bhattacharya, senior research analyst (paints & coatings Market), MarketsandMarkets. He further added that the growth of industrial coatings market will be driven by the demand for green & emerging technologies such as UV/EB and powder coatings for protective functions.

Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

Market Trends The gamut of applications of industrial coatings is vast and varied. From automotive, construction, marine, oil & gas, metallurgy & metal forming, aerospace, mining, medical & healthcare, the possibilities of innovation for industrial coatings is endless. Investments in renewable energy, particularly wind power, will also hold endless opportunities for this market.

However, each industry is looking for unique coating solutions for its various applications and hence, end-use specific coating solutions are becoming more and more important for the industry. While construction and infrastructure industry demands for corrosion and fire protection coating solutions, automotive industry is trending with self-healing coatings. The oil and gas industry, which constantly fights with corrosion due to water, H2S, CO2, sodium chloride and sulfuric acid, is always on a look out for better anti corrosive coatings. Currently, coatings made from epoxy, alkyd, polyurethanes and acrylic are being used on pipelines and other components to suit the need.

The aerospace industry could do with an extra ounce of lighter coating to bring down the overall weight of the aircraft while also providing resistance to the damaging effects of wind, water and UV rays that can lead to deterioration, erosion and cracking. Customers are not just looking for sustainable and durable protection, but they want a stoke of coat to be multifunctional by providing better colour retention, enable weight reduction, protect from environment and chemical exposures and have minimal environmental impact while also being quick and easy to apply.

Rhino Linings Corporation tried to achieve such a result with its product HiChem 1170 which is a two-component, chemical

resistant, zero-VOC polyurethane lining.

“This industrial-grade chemical-resistant coating is ideal for businesses looking to extend the life of company equipment and facilities while meeting stringent federal containment regulations concerning waste management and safety storage of hazardous materials,” said Pierre Gagnon, president and CEO, Rhino Linings Corporation. New coating technologies are constantly trying to fill up these demands.

“Introduction of bio-based industrial coatings, booming demand of powdered coatings, development of reactive liquid polymers, focus towards fluoropolymer coatings, rising demand of automotive OEM coatings and multifunctional coatings will be the key driver of this market,” said Chechi. Recently a project team from car maker Audi, BASF´s Coatings division and materials company Covestro successfully tested a clearcoat containing a biobased hardener on Audi Q2. BASF developed the clearcoat using the biobased hardener Desmodur® eco N 7300 from Covestro which is made from 70 percent renewable raw materials. The clearcoat gave the car scratch resistance, a glossy appearance and protection against sunlight and other weather effects.

“Using renewable raw materials in the production of bio-based hardeners helps to conserve fossil resources. At the same time, the biomass, as it grows, captures CO2 in the environment. In addition, process steps are eliminated during bio-based raw material production for this hardener, thus leading to an additional reduction of CO2 emissions,” said Dr Markus Mechtel, head of marketing for automotive coatings, Covestro. Apart from these, automation too

The overall industrial coatings industry is fragmented but is consolidating with top 10 players having ~40% market share.

Giant players are acquiring small and medium sized companies serving specific end-use industry/ technology. These acquisitions can be believed to state that the companies are increasing their footprints in the green & sustainable technologies.

Annirban Bhattacharya, Senior Research Analyst (Paints and Coatings Market), MarketsandMarkets.

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COATINGS SPECIAL INDUSTRIAL COATINGS is playing a major role in this industry to bring in speed and precision which is much required in the industry. Paint application supplier, Durr, recently introduced its paint robot, EcoRP 10 R1100, to meet the need for an easy entry into automized production with high rotational atomizer technology. “High rotational atomizers, which have been established in the automotive industry for many years, are definitely of major interest for the general industry.

The higher transfer efficiency together with the superior achievable surface quality along with its spray pattern flexibility allows customers to adjust to their needs whenever necessary,” said Carls.

There are few other trends that are keeping the coatings manufacturers on their toes:

Solvent Vs Water-based coatings: Solvent-based coatings dominated the industrial coatings market for long.

However, these coatings are losing its market share due to growing environmental concerns, government legislation and VOC emissions making way for other coatings, especially powder and water-based industrial coatings.

Although solvent-based coatings still hold the majority share in the market, various researches suggest that they are projected to be surpassed by water-based and other coatings in the future which have lower or no VOC emissions. Water-based coatings also provide good adhesion to metal and offer solid resistance to weather, chemicals and other harsh conditions.

“Water-based coatings uses water as a solvent (not necessarily contain zero solvents, though), making them environment friendly as compared to solvent based coatings. When working in confined or poorly ventilated area, the evaporation of solvents can be hazardous to the workers’ health. For instance, projects involving fuel storage tanks and railroad tank cars make use of water-based coatings.

These also reduce the concentration of flammable materials that build up in a confined space,” said Bhattacharya.

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“Environmental compliance (especially in North America & Europe) is also a major reason for adopting water-based coating by the coatings manufacturers. As many solvents evaporate in the air, the National, state and local governments often regulate VOCs by limiting how much businesses are allowed to emit in a given timespan. As the EPA sets national rules for VOCs, imposing intensive efforts to limit the VOC emission makes the water-based coatings to gain more popularity in the future as compared to the solvent based coatings,” he added.

Automation of the paint process is still not wide spread in the general industry.

However, there is a major growth expected for South East Asia and China due to constant overall growth rate where higher quality products are produced.

Alexander Carls, Manager Product Management, (Application Technology/ Industrial Products), Durr Systems AG. Dürr said that it experiences a slight change from water-based to solvent-based coatings. “Water-based coatings are more sensitive and therefore require a stable and sophisticated environment, which is not available in all cases. On the other hand, environmental regulations become more important and strict for countries all over the world, which leads to a higher need of environmental friendly technology, such as water-based coating,” said Carls.

Self-healing coatings: A scratch on car is probably the last thing that you would want to fret about as coatings manufacturers are working towards self-healing coatings that can

repair scratches and abrasions on car surfaces. Several companies are working towards commercializing this technology.

Covestro, came up with a polyurethane (PU) coating a few year back, where the crosslinked PU coating has its own “polymer memory” which is triggered by heat when a car sits out in the sun and the bonds return to their original shape making the scratch to disappear.

Bio-based coatings: Most industrial coatings are derived from petrochemicals not just making the market subject to volatile crude oil prices, but also increasing environment concerns and increasing the dependency on an already depleting raw material source. Hence, most companies are turning their R&D efforts towards bio-based alternatives wherein eco-friendly coatings are being produced from castor oil, soybean oil, sunflower oil, rapeseed oil, and succinic acid.

Using Nanotechnology: Innumerable researches are happening wherein nanotechnology is being infused into coating manufacturing to modify specific properties (such as scratch, mar, wear, corrosion, and UV resistance) in highly specialized applications. Studies are also happening to make coatings with easy dispersion, low viscosity etc. According to a recent research, the presence of high-quality nanoparticles in coating formulations contribute to tougher and more reliable coatings. These coatings respond to single/ multiple external stimuli, such as light, dirt, pH changes, temperature, aggressive liquids, bio-foulant, impact, fatigue, and have demonstrated outstanding, barrier properties with scratch resistance, in-situ healing, superhydrophobicity, superoleophilicity, high optical transmission, thermal stability, and resistance to strong acids, resulting in extended service life of the coatings and protected metallic materials.

Given the market demands, just a simple layer of coating is no longer sufficient to meet the complex requirements. The market needs smart coatings that can do complex jobs easily yet effectively.

Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

35

COATINGS SPECIAL PAINTS & COATINGS

FRESH COATING OF PAINT

H M Bharuka, Vice Chairman and Managing Director, Kansai Nerolac Paints, talks about the opportunities and challenges for the industry and the company amidst the Make in India policy, fluctuating crude oil prices and increased customer aspirations and awareness.

BY SHIVANI MODY Global trends and advancement in industrial coatings.

Factors driving growth for industrial coatings.

There are three broad trends in industrial coatings. First there has been an overall improvement in productivity within the sector. Secondly, the focus has shifted to the production of environmentally friendly products and finally, there is a constant demand to develop high durability products for better performance and longer life.

Of the major drivers for growth in the sector are the national policy on “Make in India� and the emphasis on infrastructure development. These are supported and enhanced by the increase in disposable incomes. Additionally, in the coming future as well, customer aspirations will propel demand for industrial products in the automobile sector.

Global trends and development in decorative coatings.

The global trends in decorative coatings require development of more functional coatings along with greater emphasis on creative design such as wood finish or a designer finish.

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Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

increase in demand is further augmented by increasing levels of awareness and higher disposable incomes of a larger population.

These favourable demographics and nuclear families is driving the growth in decorative coatings.

Evolving sectors of growth in powder coatings market.

Factors driving growth for decorative coatings.

In the powder coatings market, there are two main sectors of growth. One is the coatings required for the electrical segment.

Second is automotive coatings, specially in the two-wheeler segment.

Like the demand for industrial coatings, the demand for decorative coatings is also fueled by the growth in the economy and escalated infrastructure development. This

Kansai Nerolac Paints is a leader in the industrial coatings market. There is an

Business expansion plans in India and growth areas.

increased demand for industrial goods and infrastructure in the country and we are already expanding our facilities to cater to the needs of the end-user industry customers. Further, in India, the greater part of the market consists of the market for decorative coating and this segment is expected to grow much bigger in the coming years. To meet this expected demand in the near future, Kansai Nerolac Paints is already investing in branding, increasing production capacity and on improving product and product technology.

R&D and innovation in coatings industry.

The industry has a strong focus on R&D as industrial coatings needs technical innovations. The key trend is to focus on niche products for new surfaces (tailormade as per customer demand). In addition, there is an increasing focus on application technology at customer-end in order to enhance customer satisfaction.

Ultimately, the combination of paint and the application technology together ensure a high quality and differentiating finish for the customer.

Company’s value proposition and edge over peers.

The company believes in being “First.” This leadership attitude drives the decisions of the company, as is evident from decisions and actions taken in the last 15 years across various functional areas – advertisement, product launches, digitization and

Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

manufacturing. Kansai Nerolac believes in adding value for the customer through a unique combination of continuous product innovation, productivity improvement, better finish, reduction in consumption, energy saving and in many other ways.

Furthermore, we have also consciously adopted sustainability as a differentiator in the market place and have adopted “Healthy Home Paints” as a tag line. This value proposition guides us across the chain, in the form of product technology, manufacturing and vendor development programs.

Impact of ‘Make in India’ policy on the paints & coatings industry in India.

This is one sector which can boast of practicing “Make in India” since the beginning as most of paint demand of the country is currently being produced in India. However, the paint industry faces a serious challenge as far as feed stock is concerned. Domestic capacity for production of the inputs required for paint manufacture in either insufficient or unrepresented. Hence, most feed stock is imported. Therefore, the focus should be in strengthening the Make in India program for feedstocks needed for the paint industry.

Impact of GST on the paints & coatings market.

GST rate applicable for paints is 28 percent, which is revenue neutral. It will take some time for the value chain to settle. It is too

early to talk about other indirect benefits which may accrue over period of time.

We hope to see efficiency improvement in logistics and lead times. Distribution points reduction in the paint industry will be limited due to stringent service requirements. However, GST brings in a transparency and a level playing field for both small and large players in the industry.

Impact of fluctuations in oil prices on paints & coatings business in India.

Paint industry is dependent on oil both directly and indirectly in the form of derivatives. As such, when crude prices go up, it impacts both direct as well as indirect inputs to the paint industry negatively. It could also result in shortages in certain key ingredients that go into the manufacture of paints. Continuous fluctuations and volatility creates uncertainty in the business, both in terms of raw material coverage and in the pricing to end customers.

Challenges for the paints and coating industry from raw material providers Many countries are imposing new stringent environmental regulations on some of the commodities, which is affecting the availability of these commodities. Secondly, we also see the leverage of suppliers increasing due to consolidation. We need to be watchful of capacity additions to meet raw material demand over next 5 to 10 years.

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COATINGS SPECIAL COATINGS

Dr Kumar Iyer, Head, Coatings, Adhesives and Specialities, Covestro talks at length about the changing technologies that are ruling the global industrial coatings market today.

CHALLENGES DEFINE

THE OPPORTUNITY FIELDS

BY DEBARATI DAS Trends and technology advancement in the global industrial coatings market.

Sectors with growth potential in Indian polyurethane coatings market

Trends around technology advancement for the global industrial coatings market are driven by consumers (based on the convenience, reliability and experience), regulation, competition and profit & efficiency of the overall value chain.

The macroeconomic growth for India in the next 3-5 years appears to be positive.

India will continue to be the fastest growing economy with the GDP growth over 7 percent per annum. The coating market has a strong growth potential as consumption is still well below the level of more developed economies. The per capita coating consumption in India is still around 3.2/Kg which when compared to China at 7.5/kg is still low.

In the emerging markets, large & growing urban middle class, aspirational lifestyle and consumption growth are some of the growth drivers. Furthermore, market challenges define the opportunity fields.

The industry is not just demanding a great deal of coating technologies in terms of cost and quality but sustainability requirements such as energy efficiency, VOC reduction, energy consumption and CO2 emissions are also becoming increasingly more relevant and will continue to play a key role in the future.

Today the quality demands made on industrial processes are very high, but at the same time there is a need to cut costs.

Both goals can be achieved by increasing process efficiency. At Covestro, we have a wide range of solutions designed to enhance process efficiency.

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India continues to be key growth market for polyurethane coatings. PU penetration has reached maturity in some segments (eg. Auto Refinish, Flex-pack ADH), while other segments such as automotive OEM, construction, corrosion protection, wood & furniture still provide opportunities to increase our penetration of technology.

Even in the mature segments, our next generation products will enable the growth in technology for the Industry & Segment in the future.

The polyurethane technology growth would continue to be higher than the market as increasing investments in

construction, rapid urbanization, changes in socio-economic structure would drive standards around quality, efficiency and value conservation which can be fulfilled by polyurethane based coatings. Moreover, polyurethane coatings are also available as environmentally friendly waterborne system which is increasingly important in view of the VOC regulations which India will adopt in the near future.

End users’ demand from polyurethane coatings Today the customers are becoming more and more demanding in their expectations for quality, durability, sustainability and aesthetics of products. And they have more choices. The cost pressure is rising while innovation cycles are becoming faster and faster. How do we address this challenge is the goal that drives our daily work. “Inventing for you� is a commitment from our side to understand the basic values underlying these challenges. For eg. automotive fuel efficiency & CO2 regulations are driving change in body materials. To meet future fuel efficiency targets and CO2 regulations, vehicle weight has to be reduced. Future car bodies are made from different types of steel, aluminum, plastics and carbon fiber

reinforced components. This calls for new efficient solutions for painting line We appreciate partnerships that go beyond the traditional way of acting and thinking, an attitude of openness that invites to cocreate new things along with our partners and end users. We are optimistic and resourceful in finding solutions that inspire our customers and partners.

Comparing market potential of polyurethane coatings in developed and emerging markets.

PU coating technology stands for high performance and quality. The emerging markets like India are rapidly growing markets for industrial coatings. The emerging markets are relatively price conscious consumers and generally use a mix of high end and low cost coatings. More than 600-700 companies are present in the Indian industrial coatings applications.

They are largely medium and small scale enterprises who seek awareness on using high end technology. This offers a huge scope for technology up-gradation and use of high end coatings. Covestro’s investment in the technical centre at Mumbai and Jakarta has helped serve the local diversified customer needs. For emerging markets, we are focused on introducing products addressing the new trends and the unmet needs of our customers.

For developed markets, we are focusing more on introducing new PU products and solutions that improve sustainability and process efficiency. We have our product innovation center based in Shanghai, China to develop new PU products by listening to the market and act quickly with a solution for the problem.

Segments that boost demand for protective coatings Infrastructure development is the key priority and top agenda for India. The demand for protective coatings in the construction industry is the highest.

Construction industry in India accounts for more than 9 percent of GDP in India.

As per planning commission of India, India will double its investments in infrastructure to $1 trillion during the 12th Five Year Plan with half of that expected from the private sector.

Programmes such as Smart cities would boost the construction industry overall.

Increasing private investment in power, oil & gas & transport (airport, port & railways etc.) would boost the development of these segments.

Wood & furniture segment is another attractive segment. Increasing investments in construction, rapid urbanization,

Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

changes in socio-economic structure are the key trends, which drive this segment.

Moreover rapid industrialization of furniture production will further propel the usage of Polyurethane based coating in this segment.

- We will continue to optimize our production with regard to efficiency and safety.

Company’s polyurethane coatings business in India.

Focus on R&D and innovation

Covestro positioning as market shaper and market leader required investment in personnel, technical and production facilities and this will continue. As a leading player for polyurethane chemistry, we know we are competing in increasingly challenging environment today. “Inventing for you” is our clear mission statement; it talks about our commitment, our promise to deliver solutions every day that inspires our partners & our end customers.

In India, Covestro has a strong commitment to Indian market. The strategy for growth in India is to increase the use of polyurethane technology contributing to the development of high end coatings which offers value to our partners and end customers.

The investment in the production plant in Ankleshwar brings in the flexibility of dilution and in packaging like the unique 20 kg small pack for the Indian market which is a huge benefit for the medium and small scale customers to embrace polyurethane technology.

The technical centre in Mumbai helps in application development which is required for technology conversion especially Polyurethane substituting other technologies. Applications in focus are automotive, construction, general industrial and wood.

Growth plan for industrial coatings in Asia Pacific.

Covestro expects global demand for PU coatings and adhesives raw materials to rise by about 4 percent annually from 2014 to 2020, due to steady growth from key sectors such as, transportation, construction, consumer products where APAC especially China presents the strongest growth potential.

- We will control our costs to gain a competitive edge to rank among the cost leaders in our industry sector.

Our innovation focus is on key industries where the production is concentrated in the region eg. furniture, footwear and apparel, construction, automotive.

Some examples are the local innovation product, Desmodur ® IL V 170, which is a high solid low VOC wood coating hardener with strong characteristics which enable customer to develop differentiated wood coating products; INSQIN waterborne PU coating technology for coated fabrics for fashion and sports.

Easy to spray waterborne PU coating solutions for large vehicles, including trains, buses, etc. to meet the sustainable development trend in Asia, especially in China with proven commercialization success.

Ways Covestro adheres to sustainability in CAS business People, Planet & Profit are the key pillars which drives the sustainability program at Covestro. We are committed to optimizing our manufacturing processes, reducing the impact of logistics and enabling sustainability along the value chain. We aim to reduce our specific greenhouse gas emissions –those generated per metric ton of product produced – by 50 percent when compared to our base year 2005.

We will align our research and development projects (R&D) to address the UN SDGs. By 2025, 80 percent of our R&D project spending will be targeted in areas that contribute to achieving these goals, either undertaken in partnership or endorsed by recognized institutions.

We are evaluating the use of renewable raw materials. Today our sustainable product portfolio include: waterborne, waterborne UV, high solid and bio-based.

Covestro has a five pillar strategy: - We will harness the potential for growth, by offering value-adding solutions that address market and customer needs, and respond to global challenges and trends.

- We focus on sustainability for the benefit of people, planet and profit.

- Innovation is as a key element of our business. One of many examples of the inventor spirit at CAS is an innovation for the global textile industry.

To read the full interview, log on to http://www.worldofchemicals.com/media/ interviews/management

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COATINGS SPECIAL SURFACE & COATINGS

Paints & coatings have constantly witnessed change to keep up with the industry demands. X Arokianathan, Managing Director, Vitech Enviro Systems Pvt Ltd talks about this transition and various new technologies that the industry will witness in the future.

Arokianathan is also Chairman, CII - Surface & Coatings Expo 2014, 2016, 2018.

PAINTING THE JOURNEY OF

TECHNOLOGY AND COLOUR

BY SHIVANI MODY

W

ith the advent of the new generation automobile industry in late 70’s the Surface Coating Industry started taking shape with new technologies in paint applications and paints to meet the specific requirements of the automobile industry. To cater to this segment all suppliers and vendors had to comply with standard procedures of metal pretreatment and coatings for meeting the stringent specifications, which led to the proliferation of paint shop equipment manufacturers to meet the demand.

Indigenous technology providers were few in number and imported equipment’s were the norm.

This nascent industry has evolved over the last two decades with indigenous design of the equipment’s saving an enormous amount of Foreign Exchange.

The imported machines were not designed

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Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

to cater to the local tropical climate and also their prohibitive costs boosted the design and manufacture of paint shop equipment’s locally. A handful of homegrown manufacturers have now blossomed into multimillion dollar industry. The market has seen tremendous potential not only in the Automobile sector but also other industrial products such as Electrical Panels, Architectural products, Appliances, Machineries, Furniture’s, etc.

Indian paint story.

The Indian paint market is expected to reach Rs 70,875 crore by 2019-20 from around Rs 40,300 crore in 2014-15, the paint industry’s apex body projected.

The decorative paint market is expected to witness CAGR of 12.7 per cent and the industrial paint market CAGR of 9.5 per cent, according to Indian Paint Association

(IPA)’s to be launched report on the Indian Paint Market – “Size & Future of coating industry” compiled by Nielsen Corporation.

The split of the Decorative paint market to industrial market is around 75:25.

Decorative paint market size in the country was Rs 30,385 crore and the Industrial Paint Rs 9,915 crore in FY 2014-15, as per IPA. The industry had grown at a CAGR of 12.9 per cent from 2011-12 to 2014-15 in terms of value, and that for FY 2014-15, the per capita consumption of paint in India was estimated at 3.34 kg the lowest compared to other countries.

During 2015-16, the overall production of paints in India was estimated to be 4.25 million tonnes, registering a five per cent growth over the previous year. In value terms, the paint industry grew by approx.

8 per cent to Rs. 43,500 crores of which the decorative paints share was 74 per cent and the balance being industrial.

The global paints and coatings market, according to P&S Market Research, is expected to increase from $128,228.5 million in 2014, and reach up to $173,048.2 million by 2020, with a CAGR of 5.2 percent during 2015-2020.

In terms of volume, the global paints and coatings market is expected to increase from 37,273.7 million tonnes in 2014, to 46,697.4 million tonnes, by 2020.

A dab of powder.

The paint industry largely dependent on petroleum derivatives had a hit when the crude prices shot through the roof in the 80’s. Revolutionary powder paints with its superior corrosion resistant characteristics and low volatile emissions became a preferred choice of coating for several products. Powder Coating equipment were largely imported at a very high cost.

Thanks to the innovative entrepreneurs who indigenized the Powder applicators and brought the prices to affordable levels expanding the markets and facilitated the mushrooming of small applicators for job works and industrial production lines.

Powder Coatings has been the preferred choice of all appliances and vehicle parts specially those needing high corrosion resistances.

According to a new report published by Allied Market Research, titled, “World Powder Coatings Market – Opportunities and Forecasts, 2014–2022,” the powder coatings market is expected to generate $12,332 million by 2022. Powder coating in the appliances application segment occupied the major volume share in 2015 and is expected to maintain its lead throughout the analysis period. According to Allied Market Research analysts,

Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

the demand for powder coatings has increased owing to growing technological advancements and increasing demand from applications, namely, architectural; appliances; automotive; furniture; agriculture, construction, and earthmoving equipment (ACE) and general industrial.

This trend is expected to continue as it is a volatile organic compound (VOC) and solvent-free. Strict environmental regulations also boost the growth of this market. The market has witnessed moderate growth during the past few years and is expected to grow at a CAGR of 6.3 percent, in terms of volume, during the analysis period.

Key Drivers.

Significant drivers of the market include increasing adoption of powder coatings over liquid coatings, supporting environmental regulations, increasing demand for appliances, booming construction industry and rapid economic growth in emerging countries. However, difficulty in the application of thin coats is expected to impede this growth, as per some analysts.

The Paint shop Equipment industry has seen proportionate growth with the paint industry. There are no figures available as such on this industry Based on my personal experience I have seen a rapid rise in the number of entrepreneurs in the past two decades catering to the small and mid segment of the industry. Moreover the strict environmental regulations, automation, low operating cost, and quick implementation of projects has restricted the business to a few players in the Indian market.

Journey of the company and the road ahead.

Our company Vitech Enviro Systems Pvt Ltd was incorporated in 1993 when the industry was in a very nascent stage. Powder

Coatings Technology was very new and plant and machinery were imported at very high cost. Vitech grabbed the opportunity and engineered the design to suit our requirements meeting global standards and made the equipment affordable.

The company is engaged in the design, manufacture, supply and installation of the full range of Paintshop equipment such as Paint Booths, Ovens, Phosphating lines, Spray Equipments, Conveyor and Automation Systems on turnkey basis.

We had several challenging assignments in our business past two decades.

Some of the noteworthy challenges faced by us is detailed below • Painting of commercial vehicles for a vendor of a leading Truck manufacturing company to meet the quick turnaround time • A large automobile light manufacturing company wanted us to substitute a plant similar to their principal in Japan and was done successfully • A high end Clean painting facility for Auto parts such as Mirrors, Lights etc.

• Facility for painting Large structures such as Windmill Towers, Transformers, Machinery etc • Automatic Painting lines for painting of auto parts such as Wheels , Wheel Covers, pressed metal components etc Having established a proven record the company has been enjoying the confidence of several multinationals establishing their manufacturing units in the south for their Paintshop requirements. We are now offering our services in the western and northern region of the country. The company is poised for growth in the coming years and the potential for the industry manufacturing complete Surface Coating plants is promising.

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COATINGS SPECIAL COATINGS

COATINGS TECHNOLOGY

UPGRADATION RULES THE MARKET

BY DEBARATI DAS Trends and market potential for coatings industry in India.

One of the most recent and prominent trends suggest that water-based products are gaining market share over solventbased products in the decorative segment.

The market share by value of water-based products is estimated to be around 60 percent compared to solvent-based at 40 percent. This scenario used to be the other way round 5 to 6 years earlier.The market potential for the coatings industry is estimated to be around Rs 50,000 crore this year, till the end of March.

Naveen Kumar Bhatia, Advisor, Premium Coatings & Chemicals (P) Ltd discusses the advancement in coatings for the decorative and industrial segments in the country.

The decorative market is estimated to be around Rs 38,000 crore, while the industrial market is approximately Rs 12,000 crore. Since the last 5 years, the CAGR is showing somewhat steady growth, at around 12 percent. This growth is expected to continue in the coming few years. Historically construction and automotive segments are driving the growth of the coatings industry and this trend is likely to continue. Within the construction segment, exterior emulsions have shown comparatively higher growth in the recent past.

Raw material requirements and factor affecting the coatings market.

There are four key ingredients in the paints; ie, resins, pigments, additives and solvents.

For decorative paints, some of the pigments mainly titanium dioxide and few additives are imported. The same scenario holds true for industrial paints and additionally some specialized resins are also procured from other countries. Overall imports are quite substantial and the prices vary based on international crude oil/petroleum prices.

Also US dollar rates and demand-supply gap too, play important roles.

Company expansion plans and focus areas for growth.

In the near future, we would like to stabilize and consolidate the production in our

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manufacturing facilities. The company’s focus would be on wood and glass segments, which are likely to grow at a faster rate. In terms of R&D and innovation, we mainly concentrate on specialty coatings, which are used on metals (ferrous and nonferrous), concrete/ cemented surfaces, wood, plastics and glass substrates. Main focus is on areas where conventional paints do not provide good adhesion and desired properties or required service life. The company has also developed in-mold coatings for steering wheels, which is an import substitute.

Further, we manufacture a range of polyurethane coatings, suited for a wide variety of substrates. The coatings not only add aesthetics to the coated products, they also provide the enhanced service life.

Challenges faced by the coatings manufacturers.

Coating users always look for cost effective, environment friendly and durable coatings. Due to open markets, coating users are aware of global market trends and expect similar products from Indian manufacturers. This has resulted in upgradation of technology in all related functions and has made market quite competitive.The environment friendly products are mainly (i) water-based (ii) lead/heavy metal free and (iii) low VOC. Most of the organized companies have taken this step to convert products to the above categories mainly in the decorative segment. In the industrial sector, the progress is comparatively slow due to technical and commercial reasons.

For MSMEs, it is a major challenge to compete with organized players as the procurement cost and manufacturing losses vary substantially with the scale of operation. MSMEs also face difficulties in accessing and adopting the latest technology for product up-gradation and manufacturing processes. The organized sector’s main challenge is to compete technically and commercially with overseas players.

Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

43

COATINGS SPECIAL ELECTROPLATING

ADDING SHEEN TO

THE AUTO, ELECTRONIC AND FASHION INDUSTRY

Gautam Kumar Bhalotra, Managing Director, Plating Sheen Chem (India) Pvt Ltd (PCI Chemicals) mentions how electroplating chemicals have evolved and that the country has become self sufficient in the segment.

BY DEBARATI DAS Trends, market potential in the electroplating chemicals industry.

The global electroplating chemicals industry is expected to increase, as significant opportunities for growth exist in the growing/emerging markets. The global electroplating market was valued above $14,540.5 million in 2016 and is expected to expand at a CAGR of 3.7 percent to cross $21,160.0 million by the end of 2026.

The electroplating industry in India has become self sufficient, attaining world standard through its technical prowess. It has evolved to become a major hub in the South West Asian regions. Rising demands for consumer goods, which mandates more surface finishing services, growing demand

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Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

for automobiles, fashion and hardware, robust growth of electronic industry are some of the key factors.

The Indian electroplating chemicals industry not only fulfills the domestic rising demands but it has grown to influence the markets all over the world, particularly countries such as Bangladesh, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, as well as parts of Asean & Middle East, Africa and Latin America.

India is considered a potential market owing to low-cost, skilled workforce and rising trends of setting up of production plants such as automotive, electronics, hardware, aerospace etc. Thus demographic shift in the consumption of electroplating from the West to India has provided us a

great opportunity. Budding partnerships with OEMs and long-term contracts are expected to provide further demand for electroplating chemicals in India.

Factors supporting increased demand for nickel and zinc plating chemicals.

The increased demand of nickel and zinc plating chemicals is contributed mainly by the automotive and hardware sectors.

Nickel plating offers high lustrous aesthetic finishes, corrosion protection and wear resistance. In the automobile industry it can be found on bumpers, rims, exhausts and trims as an undercoat to chromium plating. Bath fittings, hand tools, locks etc are also the areas where nickel plating

chemicals are extensively used. Similarly zinc plating is typically used for screws, fasteners, switch plates, springs etc. As I already mentioned, India has become a manufacturing hub for the global leaders in automotive sector. Following this, the ancillary industries have grown sharply in consistence to supply finished electroplated parts. The electroplating chemicals in India are now indigenously formulated to provide aesthetics and corrosion resistance to such parts at par with the global requirements.

Advancement in the precious electroplating chemicals segment.

Precious metals exhibit a number of properties that make them valuable for use in a variety of industrial electroplating processes. Many of these metals offer appealing finishes, superior resistance against corrosion and wear. The demand from the electronics market for smaller, faster and cheaper components are the major driving force in India. Precious metal plating chemicals has and will always have a major role in achieving these demands. Gold, palladium and silver, all have their role to play in this market as new technologies emerge to make them more cost effective. Gold plating chemicals is still the major driver, for PCB and connectors.

Use of nanotechnology in the electroplating chemicals industry.

The use of nanotechnology in electroplating is still an area that has scope for future development. Although worldwide a lot of patents have been registered, the commercial ones are yet to score. In this area, we are developing newer products by incorporating nanotechnology in the field of electroplating and electroless platings to provide high corrosion resistance, strength,

Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

hardness and durability with commercial success.

What are the demands of electroplaters.

Quality standards continue to become stricter, pushed by OEMs to increase the life span of the electroplated products without compromising with the aesthetic finishes. At the same time, the global need for greener technologies has the research & development team working round the clock.

Newer finishes particularly in the fashion industry, which are developed in the West are immediately demanded by end users in the country. This also helps us to compete globally with better quality products at par with international standards.

Future growth and expansion plans for the company.

For over 33 years, the company is manufacturing and exporting its proprietary electroplating chemistries and processes spanning a range of 250 products. It continues to promote surface finishing technology innovation that improves quality, affordability and durability for extensive line of products from pretreatment to post treatment.

Our company has recently increased the installed capacity of our Haryana unit to cater the increased demand of our products.

Thus, this year, the product portfolio is also likely to increase to with the launch of 50 new formulations. PCI’s approach towards innovation and consumer demands remain the basic objective. We have also started manufacturing full range of brush plating chemicals, first time in India, which were earlier imported.

Our international business is growing and this year we plan to appoint eight more distributors across the globe. This will be a

step forward in the direction of achieving presence in the global markets, particularly in the emerging markets such as Vietnam, Cambodia and Philippines.

‘Green Leaf Technology’ and equipment for electroplating market.

The company continues its leadership in R&D. Our strategy is to have at least 50 more product launches this year. Of the new launches, 22 products are from ‘Green Leaf Technology’ portfolio. This technology refers to our products, which substitute the use of hazardous chemicals such as cyanides, hexavalent chrome, acids etc with eco friendly chemicals. This programme aims to eliminate the use of hazardous items from electroplating processes and instead employ greener and cleaner cost effective electroplating chemicals with better performance.

PCI also provides automatic, semi automatic and manual plating equipments for the electroplating industry. Turnkey projects from installation to commissioning are undertaken by our experienced and well-qualified teams. Some of these equipment include fabricated tanks, barrels, rectifiers, filters, ETP etc and other related equipment.

Challenges faced in the electroplating chemicals market.

Regulations and OEMs have become more demanding than ever before. They are looking for green solutions and restricting the use of CMR substances across all regions. The restricted substances list has already crossed 3400 products.

These demands are fulfilled by us, with continuous, cost effective innovations and introduction of eco friendly plating chemicals for the electroplating industry.

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INTERNATIONAL FOCUS ASIA PACIFIC

CHEMICAL SECTOR IN

MIDST OF STEADY RECOVERY

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Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

BY MAHESH HEGDE

A

sia Pacific (APAC) chemical sector has been staging a tentative recovery from tough economic phases over the past few years. Driven partly by China’s surging chemical demand, the sector is likely to gain an uptick owing to a leap in merger & acquisition deals, and investment activity in the region. A challenging and steadily recovering global economy is leading towards increased joint ventures in APAC.

Changing regulations to influence growth of chemical sector European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) imposed REACH and CLP regulations related to chemical manufacturing in the previous decade. ECHA helps chemical companies in complying with the legislation, advancing safe utilization of chemicals and providing associated information as well as addressing concerns.

These regulations aim to ensure protection of environment and human health from hazards associated with chemicals and their production, promoting alternative procedures for assessment of hazardous substances, while enhancing innovation and competitiveness.

REACH and CLP regulations are not only impacting Europe, but also influencing the chemical sector in Asia Pacific. Several APAC countries have reviewed their chemical policies & regulations, referring to REACH as a model. For example - India published the Draft National Chemical Policy, aiming to consolidate multiple legislations into one law. In addition, Korea introduced K-REACH, the Registration & Evaluation of Chemical Substances Act. Even Japan has followed the footsteps of the European REACH regulation.

Representatives from Japan and Korea visited ECHA for learning more about the way of ECHA’s implementation of REACH and CLP regulations. These incidences have made rapid changes to the chemical sector in Korea, India and Japan, focusing more on public health, safety and environment.

Formerly, Indian chemical sector discerned REACH and CLP regulations as technical barriers, however, post-initiative of Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) as well as Sustainable Support Services, events were organized across the nation for creating awareness about REACH compliance.

personal & home care products, organic synthesis, process development, and crop protection. This new plant of BASF comprises state-of-art laboratories for analytics, process development, application and chemical synthesis. According to Raman Ramachandran, South Asia’s head of BASF operations, nearly $340 million has been invested in R&D and manufacturing over the past four years.

He also stated that with initiatives such as Swachh Bharat, Smart Cities, and Make in India, the country is experiencing robust and sustainable development, paving significant opportunities for the chemical sector.

The impending National Chemical Policy of the Indian Government promises to offer an enabling environment, create duty structure and infrastructure facilities for the chemical sector. Managing director of VAV Life Sciences, Arun Kedia, stated that shifting focus of the specialty chemicals industry from trivial chemical molecules towards functionally demonstrable solutions will solve specific customer challenges or bring about significant improvements in industry applications. In addition, Sanjeev Gandhi – member of the Board of Executive Directors of BASF SE for Asia Pacific region, stated that worst for chemical sector in the region is behind, and steady improvement will be witnessed in demand. He expects commodity chemical producers to recover at a slow pace in the near future.

Focus shifting to improve chemical enterprises’ regulatory compliance work

Rough patch in chemical sector seems to be getting over

The Summit Meeting on Chemical Regulations (SMCR) in Asia Pacific acts as a pioneer for communicating regulations associated with chemicals in the region.

SMCR invites industry representatives, officials, and chemical regulatory experts for sharing updates and compliance solutions.

Asia Pacific has emerged as a hub for chemical manufacturing and exports over the recent past. This has led several global leading companies to not only make huge investments in the region’s chemical sector, but also set up their own sites to increase their presence in this emerging market.

In a bid to consolidate its position in this lucrative market, BASF has invested in setting up a research and development center in Mumbai, India. The plant will focus on R&D initiatives in the spheres of

This further assists collaboration among APAC countries, builds transparent sharing of enforcement measures and regulatory updates, and promotes sustainability & safety of chemical industries in the region.

According to a recent SMCR held in 2016 in Tokyo, Japan, Asia Pacific is treading along to become one of the most promising markets for chemicals across the globe, catering to one-third of the global demand.

Under strict inspection and supervision of authorities such as China’s National

Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

Registration Centre for Chemicals (NRCC), the chemical sector in APAC is now focusing on improving the chemical enterprises’ regulatory compliance work, and stability in production & trade. They are also concentrating on turning challenges faced by chemical enterprises into opportunities, while resolving technology gaps, increased costs and lack of experience.

APAC’s Importance to Chemical Industry Can Never be Underestimated - EDB, Singapore The Government of Singapore’s Economic Development Board (EDB) plans & executes strategies for sustaining Singapore as the leading global center for investment and business. According to EDB, APAC’s importance to chemical industry can never be underestimated. The rapidly growing middle class population of Asia demands more consumer goods & electronics, better crop yields, and improved water treatment - all of these involve design of cost-efficient, advanced chemical systems. The board also estimates huge demand for chemicals to be used in the production of electronics and machinery for use within the region as well as for export. In addition, growth prospects for various specialty chemicals are being leveraged by surging demand from end-use industries, especially for mining, polymers and electronics.

EDB also projects demand for oilfield chemicals to soar on the back of APAC’s quick-paced upstream activity. According to EDB, necessity for innovation, coupled with industry consolidation, will cause turbulence in every aspect of traditional manufacturing, transport, and utilization of specialty chemicals in Asia. However, better living standards and stellar economic growth can herald a bright future for the entire chemical sector in Asia Pacific.

The prospects of APAC chemical sector look encouraging, with diminishing uncertainty calming nerves across the supply chain. Although the sector has gone through its share of ups and downs, its return to a period of sustained growth can boost investor confidence. Introduction of new, innovative products appears can catalyze growth, giving a fillip to sectors which have borne the brunt during the period of sluggishness. However, chemical companies can adopt strategies to create opportunities for profitable growth including smarter portfolio management, digitization, and value capture.

Author: Mahesh Hegde is Features Writer at Future Market Insights.

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INTERNATIONAL FOCUS SINGAPORE

CHEMICAL INDUSTRY TO

LEVERAGE IIOT OPPORTUNITY The adoption of digital technologies in the industry can create new sustainable advantage for their industry to improve operations and develop top-lined opportunities, including new products and services.

As Singapore moves forward with the implementation of IOTs, it will be able to improve productivity and maximise resource efficiency through the use digital tools such as predictive asset management to track maintenance or video analytics to digitally control the use of valves and pumps in a process plants. This will promote Singapore as a worldclass advanced manufacturer with good sustainability practices among our industry players, strengthening and exploiting opportunities.

Latest R&D and innovation in the industry.

In an attempt to leverage technology to drive innovation in the rapidly changing economy, the Industry Transformation Map (ITM) has been launched to help industry develop strategies to support the development of new products and processes to increase efficiency and productivity. As Singapore moves towards developing sustainable long-term strategies to ensure the next phase of growth in its energy and chemical industry through the development of new sustainable feedstock and technology, the ITMs will serve as an enabler to facilitate new R&D innovations. Through this industry-focused Government initiative, Singapore can strengthen the current system and further optimize our scarce resources by exploring integrated innovative solutions despite any shifts in momentum to maintain its position as frontrunners in the region.

Views on improving international trade with Asia Pacific markets.

Singapore is a key chemical hub in the Asia Pacific and the Singapore Chemical Industry Council is constantly taking steps to strengthen ties with countries in the region. For example, through the ASEAN Regulatory Cooperation Project, we work closely with the American Chemistry Council and the Japanese Chemical Industry Association to help advance chemical regulatory cooperation in the ASEAN region.

Such coordinated effort is essential in ensuring the region stay relevant and updated on issues in the region. Regional events such as the Asia Petroleum Industry Conference also allows further sharing and exchanging of information on how we could improve the industry as a whole, and hence facilitating trade.

Promoting safety and protection of the environment.

Suiniaty Basirun, Chairperson, Singapore Chemical Industry Council (SCIC) talks about the opportunities and challenges faced by the chemical industry in Singapore.

BY SHIVANI MODY Opportunity in the chemical industry in Singapore.

Technological advancement has allowed companies to embrace the Internet of Things (IOTs) in the recent years. With digitalisation and the integration of IOTs in the processing plants, chemical companies are starting to leverage digital tools and capabilities to develop more accurate and agile planning, heighten customer awareness and collaborate with business partners throughout the value chain.

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Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

The industry advocates the voluntary Responsible Care Program, which drives continuous improvement in the areas of health, safety & environmental performance. Companies benchmark themselves and one another on safety practices across various codes including the most recent code – Security. SCIC has a dedicated workgroup overseeing this program and is continuously reaching out to new members, including the smaller companies to participate the program. The Safety Case regime for Singapore is another avenue to help companies build capability in the implementation of Safety Case to equip chemical manufacturers with in-depth skills and technical knowledge.

Issues faced by the chemical industry.

SCIC faces challenges in the areas of tightening labour market, the recently -introduced carbon tax pricing and increasing regulatory requirements. As a voice for the industry, the council represents its members to address issues and challenges including these through knowledge-driven sharing and negotiations via its connections with the relevant authorities/expertise. To date, SCIC has 10 active dedicated committees set up with industry participation to help find solutions to address challenges faced.

REPORT ACRYLIC SURFACE COATINGS

ACRYLIC COATINGS TO PROVIDE ECO-FRIENDLY SOLUTIONS A

crylic surface coatings are fastdrying paints comprising pigments suspended in acrylic polymer emulsion.

These coatings are made up of a methacrylic or acrylic polymer that possesses strong color retention property. Acrylic coatings are soluble in water; however, they become water-resistant in the dry state.

Different technologies used in acrylic surface coatings include waterborne coating, solvent-borne coating, and powder coating. Acrylic surface coatings are characterized by properties such as high surface hardness and elastomeric finish when applied as roof coating on buildings.

Acrylic surface coating has a wide variety of advantages such as low drying time, ease of application, wide pigment compatibility, and environmentally friendly nature. The substrate is either coated completely or partially depending on the context of usage, cost, level of protection, and compatibility.

Surface properties of the substrate can be modified by acrylic coating depending on the purpose it serves such as decorative or functional. Acrylic surface coatings are segmented on the basis of their substrates into concrete, plastic, metals, and wood.

Construction industry is one of the major end user industries for concrete substrate acrylic coatings, as it serves many applications in construction and buildings. Urbanization and infrastructure development have led to high growth in

the construction sector, thereby increasing demand for concrete-based acrylic coatings.

Rise in disposable income in emerging economies has propelled demand for wood furniture. This, in turn, has fueled demand for wood substrate acrylic coatings.

Japan. Growth in the automobile sector in countries such as India, China, Indonesia, Japan, and South Korea has boosted growth of the market in Asia Pacific. This, in turn, would aid Asia Pacific to retain its market position during the next few years.

Increasing demand for metal substrate acrylic coatings in applications such as automobiles, machinery and equipment, aluminum and steel coil, and freight containers is expected to fuel the market growth in the next few years. Applications of waterborne coatings is increasing as these coatings possess beneficial characteristics such as good heat resistance, abrasiveness, and eco-friendly nature.

This, in turn, is estimated to drive demand for acrylic surface coatings in the next few years. Excellent external durability of acrylic coatings has boosted consumption of acrylic coatings in applications such as architectural and automotive refinishes.

Europe is one of the largest markets for furniture across the globe. Demand for wood substrate acrylic coating in Europe is anticipated to witness steady growth during the next few years. Rising disposable income in Asia Pacific is expected to propel demand for aesthetically appealing coatings. This, in turn, is projected to drive demand for decorative paints and coatings during the forecast period.

Increasing demand from major end user industries such as construction and automotive and high future growth prospects for acrylic surface coatings have resulted in several global players undertaking capacity expansion across the globe. Furthermore, acrylic coatings are eco-friendly in nature. Hence, environmental regulations play a vital role in fueling demand for acrylic surface coatings.

Some of the key companies operating in the acrylic surface coating market include BASF SE, The Dow Chemical Company, Axalta Coating Systems, NIPSEA Group, PPG Industries Inc, The Valspar Corporation, The Sherwin-Williams Company and Asian Paints.

The global market for acrylic coatings is segmented into regions such as Asia Pacific, North America, Europe, Middle East and Africa, and Latin America. Asia Pacific accounted for major share of the acrylic coating market in 2014 followed by North America and Europe. Asia Pacific is anticipated to continue to witness high growth during the next few years owing to growth in end-user industries such as construction, automotive, furniture, and metal in countries such as India, China, and

Source: Transparency Market Research

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Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

AUTOMOTIVE ADHESIVES

ADHESIVES & SEALANTS TO MAKE CARS LIGHTER, TOUGHER A

dhesives and sealants are the most versatile bonding agents available today and are used by automakers to make cars lighter and tougher. Adhesives are made from precise blends of synthetic rubber elastomers, resins and agents or additives used to enhance certain characteristics, depending on the end use.

Automakers use aluminum and composites that cannot be welded together but have to be glued to hold the body parts together even at top speed and high pressure.

Adhesives do not lose strength and hence are used for these applications. Adhesives bonding renders the vehicles quieter, more durable and safer and are replacing conventional joining techniques such as welding, riveting and bolting.

Adhesives find numerous applications in the automobile industry and have revolutionized the way automobiles have been designed and built. Adhesives are used to assemble rubber, metal, glass, plastics and numerous other materials during the manufacture of automobiles.

Adhesives help prevent the ingress of salt, dirt and water in the car body shell.

Adhesives help in improving body stiffness and durability and provide improved crash performance.

Every stage of production of an automobile, whether for non-load-bearing body components or structural parts, uses

adhesives in one form or other. Adhesives are used in manufacture of engines, body components, gear boxes and mounted parts such as wing mirrors, seats and steering wheels. Interior applications include tray systems, safety systems, seating systems, as well as sub assembly and acoustical material assembly. In addition, adhesives are used for direct glazing, where they contribute to an increased rigidity of the car body.

for adhesives in South Korea, Japan, Malaysia, Vietnam, China, Australia and India.

Adhesives can be applied with high speed on the production line, which results in cost reduction and savings. Hence, adhesive consumption per vehicle is expected to increase, as automotive designers continue to exploit the cost saving potential of adhesives. In addition, adhesives help to cut down on noise, vibration and harshness characteristics.

The industry remains fragmented, with numerous medium-sized companies with a high level of customization, particularly in the highest-value adhesive segments. The cost of producing adhesives is attributable to the cost of the raw materials along with the requisite service component of training customers and helping them resolve manufacturing issues.

Adhesives improve fuel efficiency of automobiles and provide enhanced performance which is a key driving factor behind the advancement of adhesives in the automotive industry.

Some of the key players in this market are Sika AG (Switzerland), The Dow Chemical Company (US), Bayer (Germany), Henkel (Germany), BASF (Germany), 3M Company (US), Ashland Specialty Chemical Company (US), H B Fuller Company (US), Hindustan Adhesives Limited (India), ExxonMobil Chemical Company (US), Dynea International Oy (Finland), Forbo Adhesives Switzerland (Switzerland), Hexion Specialty Chemicals (US) and Covalence Adhesives (US) among others.

Consistent growth and presence of wide range of suppliers, distributors and manufacturers are some of the characteristics of the adhesives market.

Asia-Pacific, Eastern Europe, and Latin America hold potential for growth. Asia Pacific is the fastest growing region for the adhesives industry due to growing demand

North America and Europe are saturated markets and will grow with a low compound annual growth rate in the near future. The adhesive market in the US has lost ground to China due to migration of manufacturing facilities to China but the country continues to play a significant role in the adhesives market.

Source: Persistence Market Research

Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

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REPORT INDUSTRIAL ADHESIVES

INDUSTRIAL ADHESIVES TO EXPAND MODERATELY IN VOLUME TERMS

G

lobal Industrial Adhesives Market size is expected to expand at moderate growth rate in terms of volume during the forecast period. Healthy growth of the product is attributed to the replacement of mechanical fasteners with these adhesives in various end-user industries such as consumer durables, automotive, construction, packaging, aerospace, and other heavy industries.

Major application of industrial adhesives is in automobile industry, using these adhesives as a substitute to metal fasteners reduces weight of the vehicle by almost 15 percent. Further, these adhesives are environment friendly as compared to other type of fixtures, as vehicle becomes more fuel efficient due to its low weight, resulting in reduced carbon emissions. These advantages are increasing the adoption of industrial adhesives in automobile application.

Automobile industry is growing significantly in South East Asia coupled with well-established market in Germany and Japan. Launch of affordable vehicle categories and consumer awareness regarding luxurious car segments are the factors boosting vehicle purchase, leading to thriving industrial adhesives market.

Industrial adhesives are preferred in consumer durables for packaging and assembling, due to ease of its use in terms of flexibility, lesser cure time and better adhesion. Increased number of attractive consumer appliances along with rise in purchase power of consumers have flourished consumer durables market

in recent years, thus bolstering global industrial adhesives market.

Many internal parts of aircrafts need a high-quality adhesion to keep them intact, also adhesives are used to assemble outer body of the airplanes. As each gram in these aircrafts counts a lot in terms of its fuel consumption and safety, so utmost care is taken to use adhesives instead of metal or any other fasteners in manufacturing of these aircrafts.

Though aerospace industry is suffering from a stagnant growth in recent years due to economic slowdown but is anticipated to cope up with rapid pace in next 7 years.

This upliftment in aerospace industry is expected to fuel industrial adhesives consumption during the forecast period.

Industrial adhesives are used in construction industry for various applications such as furniture, making plaster, false ceiling, tiles, attractive aesthetic designs etc.

Additionally, escalating hospitality sector has increased the demand for exceptional quality aesthetic that can be achieved through these adhesives.

Further, consumer awareness for better infrastructure and interior designing concepts have developed the demand of false ceiling, tiles and plaster, leading to growth of industrial adhesives market.

Raw material prices of the product are oscillating in nature and also there are stringent government regulations associated with the manufacturing of these adhesives for environmental concerns.

These considerations can slowdown the consumption of the product in near future.

Based on the type, the market is segmented as solvent-based adhesives, water-based adhesives, pressure sensitive adhesives, hot melt adhesives, and others. As per the composition type, industrial adhesives market is divided as polyurethane, polyvinyl acetate, ethyl vinyl acetate, epoxy and acrylic. With respect to end-user industry, the market is classified into automobile, construction, packaging, aerospace, and others.

Europe is forecasted to contribute substantially in industrial adhesives market owing to its developed automobile and aerospace market in Germany, UK and Spain. Asia Pacific is the next promising region in the global market due to the booming construction and consumer durable industry in China, India, Japan and South Korea.

Establishment of foreign industries owing to business-friendly government policies and rise in residential and commercial projects had boosted infrastructural development in the region. Further, Asia Pacific is anticipated to contribute significantly and can even exceed European market in terms of consumption of industrial adhesives.

Major global manufacturers in industrial adhesives market are Toyo Polymer Co Ltd, the Dow Chemical Company, Sika AG, Pidilite Industries Ltd, Mitsubishi Chemicals Corporation, Huntsman Corporation, Henkel Ag & Company Kgaa, 3M Company, Ashland Inc, BASF Se, Bemis, H B Fuller, E I Du Pont De Nemours And Company.

Source: Global Market Insights Inc

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Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

PARAXYLENE (PX) MARKET

BIO-BASED PX IN BIOPLASTICS PET BOTTLES TO CREATE NEW OPPORTUNITIES P

araxylene, also known as PX or P-Xylene, is an aromatic hydrocarbon compound, derived particularly from benzene. Paraxylene is a colourless, toxic, sweet-smelling and highly flammable chemical at room temperature. It is found naturally in petroleum and coal tar.

Paraxylene or P-Xylene is an isomer of xylene compound, derived from benzene.

Some of the other isomers of xylene include O-xylene and M-xylene.

Paraxylene finds its largest application in large-scale manufacturing of terephthalic acid for polyester; also known as parylene.

The production process of paraxylene is one of the most complicated among all the chemicals; simple crystallization of the xylene normally led to complex purification process owing to the formation of eutectic mixtures.

categorized as dimethyl terephthalate (DMT), purified terephthalic acid (PTA), dibutyl phathalate xylene (Di-PX), and others. PTA accounted for the largest share in the paraxylene market in 2013 owing to their increased use in the polyester chain.

On the other hand, DMT was the fastedgrowing segment in 2013.

In recent years, the demand-supply gap in the paraxylene market broadened owing to increasing application of paraxylene in various other non-traditional applications such as PET bottles. However, the production remains tight with limited number of manufacturers; owing to complicated manufacturing process associated with the paraxylene.

It is manufactured by catalytic reforming of naptha, a petroleum derivative, and separated in a series of adsorption or crystallization, distillation, and reaction processes from ethyl benzene, o-xylene, and m-xylene. The melting point of Paraxylene is highest among other isomers of xylene.

Increasing use of PTA in polyester manufacturing is the most-dominant driver of the global paraxylene market.

More than two-third of the total Paraxylene production was used in manufacturing pollster in 2013. Moreover, the rising demand for PET bottle resin due to increasing use of PET in soft drink and mineral water bottles is further boosting the paraxylene market.

Based on end-user application, the global paraxylene market can be broadly

Increasing use of bio-based paraxylene in bioplastics PET bottles (Bio-PET)

and other bioplastics applications such as catering utensils is creating new opportunities for the Paraxylene market.

Asia Pacific is the largest market for Paraxylene followed by Europe and North America. Asia Pacific and RoW (including Latin America, the Middle East, and Africa) are two of the fasted-growing Paraxylene markets, which witnessed an aboveaverage growth in recent years. Country wise - China, the US and India are some of the largest regional markets for paraxylene.

China held the largest market share in 2013 in terms of regional consumption of paraxylene. The size of the peracetic acid market is relatively low in the RoW region.

However, it is expected to witness healthy growth throughout the forecasted period, especially in petroleum-rich countries of the Middle East.

Some of the major companies operating in the global Paraxylene (Px) market include British Petroleum (BP), JX Nippon Oil & Energy, Reliance Industries, ExxonMobil, BASF, Braskem, Chevron Phillips Chemical, Dragon Aromatics, Fujian Refining & Petrochemical, Toray Industries, Pemex, Kuwait Paraxylene Production and Samsung Total Petrochemicals.

Source: Persistence Market Research

Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

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EVENT COVERAGE ARC ADVISORY

IIOT:

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Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

- SMART MACHINES - SMARTER BUSINESS - SMARTEST RETURNS

BY DEBARATI DAS

T

he need of the hour for any and every industry is to be faster, accurate and connected. For this, the global industry is unanimously striding towards becoming an integral part of the Industry 4.0 revolution with smart machines, smart operations and smart manufacturing. India too is picking up the momentum to be a part of this change and employing ‘digitalized’ business processes and incorporating Industrial Internet of Things (IIOT) in their operations and services.

The ARC Advisory Group, in July, organised its Fifteenth India Forum titled Industry in Transition: Realizing the Digital Enterprise, in Bengaluru, to discuss how the country is mitigating this change in their systems. The two day forum had several international IIOT providers including Bentley Systems, Siemens Ltd, IBM, Emerson Automation Solutions etc, explaining the ways to smoothen this transition from manual to digital while giving a snapshot of the trends happening in the global industry platform.

The event also had several Indian companies who spoke about their journey while incorporating IIOT, the challenges they faced and the drastic change that this technology brought to their operations.

“Big change is happening in the software.

Leading suppliers are creating software platforms and are shifting towards open

Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

platforms helping the companies to make this transition. To become a digital enterprise, all segments of a plant (IT, operations etc) have to be connected digitally to optimize the operations,” said Andy Chatha, President, ARC Advisory Group.

The main question however was whether India is ready to change its mindset towards this revolution? Are companies ready to adopt IIOT? Are people/employees ready to move from traditional technology solutions to digital solutions? Is the management ready to invest in this digital technology?

Intelligently connected operations will enable manufacturers to improve uptime, reduce random failures and unplanned shutdowns and thus optimize operating performance making way for smarter products, new service and operating models, new production techniques, and new approaches to design and sourcing.

products and plants? How will open source solutions impact traditional software and automation domains? Is digitalization a threat to cybersecurity and, if so, how can the risk be mitigated? How ‘smart’ are smart machines, and what benefit will these bring? How do Big Data and predictive and prescriptive analytics enable operational change? How do connected products create opportunities in aftermarket services?

What software capabilities are needed to achieve transformational change? Which industries are already changing? What steps can organizations take to foster innovative thinking?

“Digital is the way to go forward. However, there is a lot to do and to be there, we need to keep the doors ajar,” said M S Niranjan, Director of Engineering, Research and Development, NASSCOM.

“ARC believes in collaborative process models to make IIoT a reality. There are so many mega trends happening in the industry. You need to think if you need to be a laggard or be a part of it,” said Ganapathiraman, VP & GM India, ARC Advisory Group.

“Indian chemical industry is in the right path to adopt IIOT in its system. Some of the major companies like ONGC, Reliance etc have already adopted IIOT in its various operations and that can be a motivation for other companies to follow. Although, it might be a slow transition, it is bound to happen,” said Anne-Marie Walters, Global Marketing Director, Bentley Systems.

The forum discussed this technology at length answering various doubts that Indian organizations have such as - How will disruptive technologies change existing

At the end, it was concurred that it is all about setting the architecture right for this transition from traditional to digital to happen.

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EVENT COVERAGE INTERVIEWS

BY DEBARATI DAS

COLLABORATE TO INTEGRATE IIOT IIOT in the global industry.

Today we are hearing a lot about IOT, Industrial IOT, Industry 4.0 and there is a lot of excitement about this topic because it offers a lot of opportunities allowing companies to improve their performance.

One of the biggest challenges for any industry today is the downtime due to equipment failure. Industry 4.0 helps companies to predict failures and eliminate downtime.

IOT makes machines smarter. Just like a simple phone that has become so much smarter and has empowered us so much today, the next thing that we will see are smart machines everywhere. These smart machines will not just improve productivity, but also eliminate risks and hazards at plants, ensure better safety, and much more.

IIOT in Indian Chemical industry.

Chemical industry is very asset intensive.

Equipment used in the plants are very expensive and thus, lowering downtime and improving reliability of these equipment is very important. Many companies are trying to do this by moving towards digitization.

Implementing IIOT in the plants is going to take many years; it is a journey that companies have to undertake. Not just reducing downtime, there are so many other ways in which IIOT can be beneficial to a company. Also, the main thing is that Indian industry has to become more competitive to be in the game. Several

Andy Chatha,

President, ARC Advisory Group had an exclusive talk with Chemical Today where he discussed about the right way to make IIOT a reality for Indian chemical industry.

Indian companies are competing with various global companies around the world and for that reason, they have to bring in newer solutions to the plant.

IIOT in SMEs. Smaller companies are challenged in many ways everywhere in the world due to fewer resources and the lack of enough technical resources. Even for larger companies, drawing high skilled people is a challenge.

Today, a lot of young talent is moving to IT due to with chemical industry, oil and gas industry and various other industries are trying to automate as much as they can to maintain this balance between growing production demand, depleting talented workforce and dearth of skilled technical workforce. However, India has a huge IT resource. Indian chemical companies should take this as an opportunity and work with partners and IT companies who can help them bring in these solutions to their plants. In future, we will have smart machines that will help us and work alongside people.

Cyber security.

One of the biggest challenges for IIOT is cyber security which is the main reason for slow adoption of IIOT solutions. However, there are many cyber security solutions available today and people are embedding these solutions in their products. Many of these newer solutions work with the cloud which is embedded with these cyber security solutions. Companies can use these solutions in the cloud and avoid hurdles with cyber security.

Trends in IIOT. As companies are bringing in more and more software into their plants, integration is becoming a big challenge. To address this challenge, many companies like Microsoft, are bringing in IIOT platforms which are more open.

So we are seeing a trend were companies are moving towards more open solutions because it is easier to integrate these open solutions than proprietary solutions.

IIOT: MORE AN INVESTMENT THAN AN EXPENSE IIOT in Process industry.

Vivek Gupta,

General Manager & Head Instrument, DCM Shriram Ltd. 56

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As of now, IIOT acceptance has been more in the manufacturing sector. As far as the process industry is concerned, there are quite a number of hazardous chemicals to deal with where one small mistake can result into havoc. That’s the reason there is still a hesitance in acceptance of something new, and thus the technology is seeping in very slowly. However, we have begun with digitizing compressors, motors, pumps, etc. IIOT in the process industry is being used more for predictive maintenance. IIOT can be very useful for having information like when a particular machine needs maintenance and when a schedule shutdown should be made. This can help in having the plant run flawlessly

with well-maintained machines without any breakdowns and losses to the company.

IIOT for SMEs. When big companies adopt certain technologies, it gives confidence to smaller companies to adopt those technologies too.

However these technologies are costly. The small industries need some off the shelf technologies that will suit their need and are in their budget. There is also a dire need to make these small companies understand the need for digital solutions. There needs to be an effort to explain that the investment on these digital solutions will be much less when compared to the losses incurred due to breakdowns and unplanned shutdowns.

The mind set needs to change and it has to come from the top.

CHANGING MINDSET BEFORE CHANGING TECHNOLOGY

Himanshu Vyas, Sr Vice President (Technology), Aditya Birla Group

Is India IIOT ready?

Digitization in process industry.

Some industries are ready but majority of the companies in India do not have the infrastructure to support IIOT. Their machines are very old, their IT system is very primitive and they do not have skilled work force to understand and effectively use IIOT solutions.

Automation was always there in the process industry, but in a limited way. But now it is slowly increasing with advanced process control tools like simulation, advanced sensor systems etc.

People think that IIOT is just machine to machine talking to improve reliability and consistency of the product. But what they don’t understand is that there is a need to change the entire business model to incorporate IIOT. If our mindset remains limited to this, then IIOT is not going to work. Also one solution will not fit all companies. A big business would need a business model which is digital but a small business with limited customer and supplier need not require supply chain digitalization but a different digitalization process to suit its needs. This understanding is very important.

Making IIOT a reality.

First we have to improve the quality of skill available in the industry. There is a huge dearth of skilled workforce in the industry as most fresh graduates detour to other industries. Job hopping is very rampant.

Analytical skill is low. This issue needs to be addressed very seriously. Also, it is the management that needs to look at IIOT as an investment and not as an expense. There are still doubts and uncertainties about this change. People are still testing the waters and before they can really implement it.

The government too can help by giving some concessions and encouraging companies towards digitization.

GROWING BUSINESS WITH DIGITAL CONNECTIVITY Going digital.

For me a digital enterprise is an organization that uses technology as a competitive advantage to integrate information, process, work, and people to bring about organizational change and drive efficiency and productivity.

Today, business focus is changing from “maintaining business” to “growing business.” Business models are changing to “consumption based” models. A digital enterprise is customer centric and demand driven - continuously seeking opportunities to transform plant and business operations, leverages real time information throughout the value chain and encourages collaboration internally and with partners.

Benefits of digitization.

Digitization of a plant reduce costs and risks, improves competency of operating personnel, helps to get higher productivity by doing more with less and brings in predictability in decision making.

Reliance’s experience with IIOT. We have been using Honeywell’s operation management solutions for the past five years, in order to have planned management

Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

of various operations. Most problems happen in the transition phase - when one shift leaves and other shift takes over and information is not correctly passed on.

Our IIOT solutions have work processes embedded in them enabling us to move from manual log book entries to electronic logs making detailed information available to every worker. These Operations Logbook secures critical shift handover and takeover processes without minimal communication gaps.

We have also implemented integrity operating windows (IOW) to predict future incidents. This solution has helped us model our operations on the basis of past incidents. For eg. the issue of a leakage in a certain pipe due to some corrosive material. Here, IOW captures the lab analysis, process parameters etc, to continuously monitor the situation notifying the maintenance team to act before any damage happens.

Acceptance of IIOT. In the petroleum industry, the digitization index is still low. The management needs to understand the importance of these solutions and the ways in which it can add value to the entire system.

Vikas Deshmukh, Vice President, Technology Center of Excellence, Reliance Industries

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ACADEMIC R&D NEW MATERIALS TO SOLVE

HYPERSONIC TRAVEL HEAT UP ISSUE

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esearchers at The University of Manchester in collaboration with Central South University (CSU), China, have created a new kind of ceramic coating that could revolutionise hypersonic travel for air, space and defense purposes.

Hypersonic travel means moving at Mach five or above, which is at least five times faster than the speed of sound. When moving at such velocity the heat generated by air and gas in the atmosphere is extremely hot and can have a serious impact on an aircraft or projectile’s structural integrity.

That is because he temperatures hitting the aircraft can reach anywhere from 2,000 to 3,000 °C. The structural problems are primarily caused by processes called oxidation and ablation. This happens when extremely hot air and gas remove surface layers from the metallic materials of the aircraft or object travelling at such high speeds. To combat the problem materials called ultra-high temperature ceramics (UHTCs) are needed in aero-engines and hypersonic vehicles such as rockets, re-entry spacecraft and defence projectiles.

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But, at present, even conventional UHTCs can’t currently satisfy the associated ablation requirements of travelling at such extreme speeds and temperatures. However, The University of Manchester researchers and the Royce Institute, in collaboration with the Central South University of China, have designed and fabricated a new carbide coating that is vastly superior in resisting temperatures up to 3,000 °C, when compared to existing UHTCs. “Future hypersonic aerospace vehicles offer the potential of a step jump in transit speeds. A hypersonic plane could fly from London to New York in just two hours and would revolutionise both commercial and commuter travel,” said professor Philip Withers, Regius professor from The University of Manchester.

So far, the carbide coating developed by teams in both University of Manchester and Central South University is proving to be 12 times better than the conventional UHTC, zirconium carbide (ZrC). ZrC is an extremely hard refractory ceramic material commercially used in tool bits for cutting tools.

The much improved performance of the coating is due to its unique structural make-up and features manufactured at the Powder Metallurgy Institute, Central South University and studied in University of Manchester, School of Materials. What makes this coating unique is that it has been made using a process called reactive melt infiltration (RMI), which dramatically reduces the time needed to make such materials, and has been in reinforced with carbon–carbon composite (C/C composite).

This makes it not only strong but extremely resistant to the usual surface degradation.

“Current candidate UHTCs for use in extreme environments are limited and it is worthwhile exploring the potential of new single-phase ceramics in terms of reduced evaporation and better oxidation resistance. In addition, it has been shown that introducing such ceramics into carbon fibre-reinforced carbon matrix composites may be an effective way of improving thermal-shock resistance,” explained professor Ping Xiao, professor of materials science, who led the study in University of Manchester.

FIXATION OF POWDER CATALYSTS

ON ELECTRODES

The envisaged industrial application necessitates catalysts to do their job for years. This new method could assist in achieving it.

The team at the Center for Electrochemical Sciences at Ruhr-Universität Bochum: Stefan Barwe, Dr Corina Andronescu, Sandra Möller, Prof Dr Wolfgang Schuhmann and Dr Justus Masa (from left to right). The home-made apparatus shown in the background allows the scientists to simultaneously explore the long-term stability of up to ten catalysts without blocking the infrastructure for other measurements.

C

hemists at Ruhr-Universitat Bochum have developed a new method to tightly fix catalyst powders on electrode surfaces. Currently, the high physical stress induced on catalyst films by gas evolving reactions hampers the application of powder based catalysts. The developed technique is potentially interesting for hydrogen production by water electrolysis. A team involving Dr Corina Andronescu, Stefan Barwe and prof Dr Wolfgang Schuhmann from the Center for Electrochemical Sciences reported on this in the international edition of Angewandte Chemie.

“Catalyst syntheses often aim for nanoparticles in order to achieve a high surface area,” Schuhmann explained.

However, tight and stable fixation of nanopowders on electrodes still remains challenging. Suitable catalyst binders exist for electrodes employed in acidic

Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

media. Such binders are often deployed in alkaline environments because of the lack of suitable alternatives. However, a major drawback of using these binder materials in alkaline electrolytes is that they are intrinsically unstable and electrically insulating, thus essentially impeding the application of many highly active and potentially industrially interesting powder catalysts.

Polymer transfoms into carbon The team from Bochum proposes a new method for tight powder catalyst fixation on metal surfaces. They utilized a specific organic polymer, namely polybenzoxazine, which transforms to carbon at temperatures around 500 degree Celsius.

The polymer was applied together with the powder catalyst on the surface of a nickel electrode and subsequently heated at high temperatures. Upon thermal treatment, the polymer transformed into a carbon matrix

embedding the powder catalyst particles.

The distinctiveness was the choice of the used polymer. Polybenzoxazines are highly thermal stable and exhibit near-zero shrinkage at higher temperatures. In the absence of oxygen, they carbonize giving high residual char.

Easy to produce “We expect that the presented method might also be applicable at an industrial scale, although this is yet to be validated.

However, the necessary procedures are already well established,” said Schuhmann.

In principle, it is the same technique as painting the door of a car.

“A mixture of catalyst and polymer could be sprayed on an electrode surface, which is then transferred into an oven,” the scientist illustrated. The team at the Center for Electrochemical Sciences already tested this at the laboratory scale.

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ACADEMIC R&D

LAB SCIENTISTS EXPLORE LIQUID ELECTROLYTES

FOR ENERGY TECHNOLOGIES

Liquid electrolytes are essential components in a variety of emerging energy technologies, including batteries, supercapacitors and solar-to-fuel devices.

T

o predict and optimize the performance of these devices, a detailed understanding of the electrolytes, particularly their electronic properties such as the ionization potential and electron affinity, is critical,” said Anh Pham, a Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) Lawrence fellow in the Quantum Simulations Group, and the lead author of a paper in an edition of Science Advances.

As an example, Pham pointed to how proper energy alignment at the electrode-electrolyte interface of photoelectrochemical (PEC) cells is key to achieving efficient hydrogen production.

Pham, along with LLNL researcher Eric Schwegler, Robert Seidel and Steven Bradforth from the University of Southern California, and Marco Govoni and Giulia Galli from the Argonne National

This artist’s impression shows various solvated ions in liquid water.

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Laboratory and the University of Chicago, have presented an experimentally validated simulation strategy for computing the electronic properties of aqueous electrolytes.

The team directly simulated and measured the electronic excitation of various solvated ions in liquid water. By combining firstprinciples molecular dynamics simulations with state-of-the-art electronic structure methods, the team could predict the excitation energies of the solvents and solutes, such as the ionization potentials of the solvated ions. The team also demonstrated that the coupling of this theoretical framework with advanced spectroscopy techniques provides a powerful tool for the identification of chemical species and reactions that occur in solutions.

The new method opens up the possibility to predict the electronic response in complex electrolytes for a range of applications.

For example, the research provided a theoretical foundation for understanding and engineering the electronic properties of liquid electrolytes in PEC cells for hydrogen production and ionic liquid for batteries.

“The proposed computational framework is general and applicable to non-metallic liquids, offering great promise in understanding and engineering solutions and liquid electrolytes for a variety of important energy technologies,” Pham said.

In a broader sense, the new simulation capability represents the first step toward a unified method for the simulation of realistic, heterogeneous interfaces in electrochemical systems.

NON-STICK COATING

RUNS AFOUL OF THE SPORES A new type of coating that prevents the build-up of mould, algae and bacteria could provide major benefits for building products, the marine industry and hospitals

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esearchers at the University of Wollongong (UOW) led ARC Research Hub for Australian Steel Manufacturing have been investigating self-cleaning, antimicrobial organic coatings for painted sheet steel to prevent the build-up of mould, algae and other bacteria on coated steel products, particularly in humid environments.

Researchers at the Intelligent Polymer Research Institute (IPRI), in collaboration with Steel Hub partner BlueScope, set about investigating a more effective and environmentally friendly coating solution. Instead of directly targeting microorganisms, the researchers looked at developing a coating that prevented them attaching to a surface in the first place.

Left unchecked, a build-up of troublesome organisms wreaks havoc on steel products, requiring more regular and costly cleaning and maintenance.

They combined silica nanoparticles with chemical compounds called zwitterions, which are naturally hydrophilic, or able to bond to water. Silica nanoparticles have already been added to paints for their abrasion resistance and flame-retardant properties, as well as being low cost and easily produced in large quantity.

In the marine industry, for example, algal growth can stick to boat and ship hulls, resulting in decreased speed and manoeuvrability as well as increasing fuel consumption.

In hospitals, bacterial contamination of surfaces such as countertops, surgical tools, and medical devices contributes to the spread of potentially deadly hospitalacquired infections.

Current solutions have been based on coatings that incorporate biocides, which release antimicrobial agents to kill target microorganisms. Yet, the effectiveness of biocides is dulled over time and eventually rendered ineffective.

Many biocides are made with toxic chemical that can have detrimental environmental effects and are often limited in application by health, safety and environmental regulations.

The zwitterions are able to bond to the nanoparticles, which in turn, are more readily attached to a surface to form a water layer or coating.

“This water layer actually forms a barrier, preventing interactions with proteins, which are often a precursor to organism attachment and subsequent biofouling,” PhD student Brianna Knowles said.

“Microorganisms can’t displace the bound water and so they’re not able to form an attachment to the surface.”

“Hydrophilic coatings also don’t pose the risk of environmental contamination and don’t promote the emergence of biocide or antibiotic-resistant organisms.”

In lab tests, the particle coatings showed an 87 per cent reduction in adhesion of microbial spores and a 96 per cent reduction in bacteria (Escherichia coli).

These results indicate the potential for the silica nanoparticles to be further developed as versatile fouling-resistant coatings for widespread coating applications.

“The technology currently is as a surface coating that can be easily applied to a range of surfaces,” research supervisor Dr Paul Molino said.

“At this stage, it could be coated directly onto an existing surface to provide fouling protection but further work could be devoted to trying to incorporate nanoparticles with hydrophilic chemistries into paints.

“We are looking at optimising this fouling resistant coating system by investigating the influence of varying the size of the modified silica nanoparticles on the adhesion of different microbial organisms, as well as investigating the modification of the silica nanoparticles with some new chemistries, with preliminary results identifying some exciting results.”

“The success of ARC research hubs are critical in providing industries such as BlueScope with access to the latest cuttingedge advances in coating technologies, while also training future leaders in the industry sector,” said project leader associate professor Michael Higgins.

A diagram of the non-stick surface coating using silicananoparticles.

Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

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ACADEMIC SPEAK LASER MATERIAL DEPOSITION

SHARPEST ANTI-CORROSION,

ANTI-WEAR AND REPAIR TECHNOLOGY Ultra-high-speed laser material deposition research.

Special coatings protect components against corrosion and wear. However, standard processes such as hard chrome plating, thermal spraying, laser material deposition or other deposition welding techniques have drawbacks. We have now developed the extreme high-speed laser material deposition process, known by its German acronym EHLA, to eliminate these drawbacks in an economical way. Highquality metal layers measured in tenths of a millimeter can be applied to large surfaces flexibly, efficiently and quickly.

Advantages and disadvantages of hard chrome plating, thermal spraying and laser material deposition methods.

The most common process for corrosion and wear protection is hard chrome plating: Chromium is taken from a chromic acid solution and deposited on a workpiece in an electrochemical bath at process temperatures of 50 to 65 degrees Celsius. However, this process is not optimal: Hard chrome layers are not metallurgically bonded to the base material and they delaminate easily. In addition, the layers show microcracks in the microstructure that reduce their resistance to corrosion and wear. Another disadvantage is that electrochemical processes consume a lot of energy and become less economical as electricity costs rise. Yet the biggest drawback concerns environmental protection.

Due to its environmental impact, chromium (VI) has been included in the EU directive EC 1907/2006. From September 2017, an authorization or a special permit will be required to use it.

Thomas Schopphoven, Graduate Engineer, Fraunhofer Institute for Laser Technology (ILT), Aachen, Germany, talks about the cutting edge research on ultra-high-speed laser material deposition technology. The new process comes out on top not only in cost, quality and sustainability, but also in retaining jobs in Europe.

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Thermal spraying likewise has disadvantages. With highvelocity oxygen fuel (HVOF) spraying, a liquid or gaseous fuel is fed into a combustion chamber, where it is ignited and burnt by adding oxygen. The powdery spray material is guided into the combustion chamber. There, the individual particles are heated, partly melted, accelerated to speeds of 600 to 1000 meters per second, and then sprayed onto the workpiece to be coated. Upon impact, the powder particles are plastically deformed and then bond to the substrate through mechanical clamping. The resulting bond is comparatively weak, which is why the substrate must be pretreated with blasting techniques. In addition, the resulting layers have a porosity of one to two volume percent. This makes it necessary to apply several layers, each some 25 to 50 micrometers thick, atop one another in order to adequately protect the component. HVOF spraying is far from resource-efficient: Several hundred liters of gas are needed per minute and only about half of the material used ultimately coats the surface of the component.

Deposition welding processes are used to produce high-quality and firmly bonded coatings. With conventional processes such as tungsten inert gas (TIG) welding or plasma powder deposition, however, the layers of 2 to 3 millimeters are often far too thick and too much material is used as a result. As much of the coating material mixes with the base material, multiple layers often must be applied.

Laser material deposition already allows for far thinner layers – between 0.5 and 1 millimeter. Since laser material deposition requires considerably lower heat input compared to conventional processes, even a single layer can provide protection.

One such example is wear protection for agricultural blades. Laser material deposition is, however, too slow for large components. Because the surface rate is only ten to fifty square centimeters per minute, it is used only for specific corrosion and wear protection applications. In the past, increasingly powerful laser beam sources and optical systems as well as widebeam powder feed nozzles were developed to achieve larger surface rates during laser material deposition. Although these efforts resulted in improved surface rates and especially deposition rates, their use for industrial coatings was insignificant. Key drawbacks are the relatively high energy input, insufficient dimensional accuracy and the subsequent need for time-intensive reworking. In addition, lasers are expensive compared to competing energy sources, such as arcs or plasma. That is why conventional material deposition processes are usually more cost-effective for thick layers.

In short, a flexible, resource-efficient and economical process for applying highquality, metallurgically bonded coatings between 25 and 250 micrometers in thickness does not exist. The EHLA process fills this gap. It offers significant advantages over hard chrome plating, thermal spraying, deposition welding processes and conventional laser material deposition and is economical.

Steps followed in developing EHLA. The following systematically derived steps were used to develop EHLA: A system for the powder-gas jet was developed and patented that accurately measures the number of particles, the position and diameter of the powder focus, as well as the speed of the powder particles layer by layer.

The data obtained then serves as basis for an in-house particle propagation model, which describes three-dimensional particle distribution: the position, direction and average velocity of the particles. We used

the measured data to model the interaction of powder particles and laser radiation – which had never been done before. Based on the results, powder feeding nozzles were optimized so that they produce a small powder focus – making it possible to adjust particle velocity and trajectory and thus the interaction time.

EHLA process to be economical, sustainable and environmentally friendly.

The chemical-free application makes the process very environmentally friendly. The resulting layers are non-porous, making pores and cracks a thing of the past. As a result, the layers protect the component much longer and more efficiently. In addition, the coating is firmly bonded to the base material and will not delaminate.

Various materials – such as iron, nickel or cobalt base alloys as well as metal matrix composites (MMCs) with ceramics and carbides– can be used for these new coatings.

The EHLA process effectively utilizes approximately ninety percent of the material, making it far more resourceeffective and economical. Since the layer is dense, one layer already offers adequate protection. It also solves the problem of layer thickness. Until recently, metallurgically bonded layers could not be thinner than 500 micro meters at elevated deposition rates. EHLA allows for layers that measure just 25 to 250 micrometers. In addition, the layers are smoother; roughness is now a mere tenth of that typical of laser material deposition.

A significant advantage lies in the heat input. Unlike laser material deposition where the powdery additive is melted in the melt pool, EHLA uses the laser beam to melt the powder particles while they are still above the melt pool. Since drops of liquid material fall into the melt pool instead of solid powder particles, less material must be melted – a few micrometers suffice instead of hundreds of micrometers. Using EHLA shrinks the heat-affected zone by a factor of one hundred: from between 500 and 1000 micrometers in conventional laser material deposition down to just 5 to 10 micrometers. Also, the EHLA powder nozzle is new, which can operate ten times longer than in conventional laser material deposition.

EHLA to have major potential in additive manufacturing.

Traditional manufacturing techniques are often characterized by a subtractive approach. Forged or cast blanks must be extensively reworked: As much as ninety percent of the original workpiece is

machined and goes unused. This increases resource consumption as well as material and manufacturing costs. With EHLA volumes can be manufactured using a hybrid-additive approach – which is the additive manufacturing of volume elements on existing components – layer by layer.

The result is a near net-shape component with almost 100% density and a property profile which meets the specifications of wrought or cast material, or even exceeds them. The size of the components is only limited by the used handling system. The major potential lies in the combination of high deposition rates and high dimensional accuracy of the applied layers.

EHLA research to benefit various industries.

EHLA’s application potential is enormous, not just in coating technology but also in additive manufacturing. In 2015, the worldwide market for hard chrome plating was estimated at $13.64 billion, while the market for thermal spraying amounted to $7.56 billion. If EHLA could capture a tenpercent share of the surface refining market – and that is a conservative estimate – this new process could account for an annual market volume of €2 billion.

Another advantage of EHLA is that it could be used for the large-scale coating of components nowadays used without coatings. This would make it possible to produce innovative components that do not wear out during a product’s lifecycle.

Moreover, EHLA could ensure that coating jobs remain in Europe – countering the trend of such jobs being outsourced to lowwage countries.

The process also bears considerable potential for additive manufacturing methods, which have grown some thirty percent on average since 2011. EHLA can contribute significantly to this growth, particularly in the manufacturing of large components.

Future research plans.

At the moment the advantages of EHLA can only be used for rotationally symmetric parts, where the high necessary feed rates of some hundred meters per minute are achieved by rotation of the parts. In a next step we want to use all the benefits of the technology for the processing of 2D and freeform parts in the field of coating, repair as well as additive manufacturing.

Therefore we are currently working on fast dynamics, high precision machines and components. Besides that we are continuing to qualify EHLA for various new applications with different material combinations and specifications to fully utilize the enormous potential.

R&D YOUNG TURKS

New composite material to remove phosphate from wastewater

SOCIETY FOR SCIENCE & THE PUBLIC

Stefan Wan Stefan Wan, 17, of Wellington, developed a new composite material to remove phosphate from wastewater and storm runoff before they are discharged into the natural environment, and recycle the material for soil enrichment for his Regeneron Science Talent Search engineering project. After seeing phosphate-driven damage in the Everglades, Stefan integrated biochar, a charcoal-like powder, with layered double hydroxides (LDH) to adsorb damaging phosphate from polluted waters. By testing variations of the materials in several combinations, he found that biochar layered between a composite of aluminum and magnesium hydroxide achieved over 95 percent phosphate saturation within one hour. He then showed how the phosphate-laden material could be recycled as a costeffective slow-release fertilizer for farm soil. A paper about his work appears in the Journal of Industrial and Engineering Chemistry.

Use of electricity to increase kinetic energy of molecules

Jackson Barker Weaver Jackson Barker Weaver, 17, of Jersey City, studied the use of electricity to increase the kinetic energy of molecules for his Regeneron Science Talent Search project in biochemistry. He began his work by asking if electrical energy would affect molecular reaction rates in the same way as thermal energy. Generally, as energy is added to a reaction, the motion of the reactant molecules and speed of enzyme catalysis increase, resulting in more rapid product formation. To explore his hypothesis, Jackson extracted peroxidase from turnips and used it to catalyze breakdown of hydrogen peroxide into water and oxygen, while varying the voltage across the reaction chamber using a circuit he designed. He concluded that an increase in voltage does lead to higher catalytic rates in enzymes, and he believes his work may eventually promote the use of small electrical currents as a medical therapy.

Source: Society for Science & the Public

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Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

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SAFETY RESPIRATORY EQUIPMENT

KEEP CHEMICALS OUT, SAY PROTECTIVE RESPIRATORY EQUIPMENT

reducing the number of potential hazards in chemical industries.

Employers, associations and a broader safety industry have built on the OSHA guidelines to educate, train and deploy safety equipment.

This has driven PPE annual growth significantly in the chemical industry and respiratory equipment has paralleled this growth.

Products seeing increased demand in the respiratory equipment segment.

The increased knowledge, awareness and investment in safety has seen a shift from negative pressure respirators to powered respirators (PAPRs) and self-contained breathing apparatus (SCBA). An understanding of acute and chronic effects on health and exposure limits were the basis for industry standard operating procedures (SOPs) for chemicals. SOPs included the recommended PPE including respirators.

Alex Birrell, CEO, CleanSpace Technology discusses the technology development and stringent protocols for the protective respiratory equipment market.

BY SHIVANI MODY Global trends in the respiratory equipment market.

The chemical industry leads the way in workplace safety and, in particular, in the use of Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) programs. Due to the use of a wide range of chemicals and the potentially harsh nature of those chemicals, airborne contaminants are high on the list of workplace hazards in the chemical industry.

For that reason, today, many chemical manufacturers are experts in respiratory protection and their staff are well trained and familiar with respiratory equipment before they start on the job.

The chemical industry’s stringent protocols and well-managed safety programs have driven the growth of PPE in this sector. This has accelerated the use of innovation in protective clothing and visor coatings. Despite the development and adoption of innovation in materials, there has been little or no innovation in respiratory equipment.

Technology development for respirators.

Improvements in exhalation valves and filter media have been the primary innovation in respiratory equipment, seen in the 1990’s (20 years ago). Since then very little has changed for respirators.

The factors for this include the cost and time involved in meeting National Standards regulatory requirements and commercial benefits for manufacturers in a growing consumables mask market.

Factors driving growth of the respiratory equipment market.

In 1984, following the death of more than two thousand people from a methyl isocyanate chemical leak in Bhopal, India, the incident drew world attention to serious hazards in the chemical industry.

Following that tragedy, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) developed guidelines to aid employers in

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Opportunity for respiratory equipment in Asia Pacific region.

China’s chemical companies continue to dominate the Asia-Pacific chemical market, replacing Germany as the world’s second largest chemical producer, after the US. The Indian chemical industry is the country’s second largest industrial sector, after IT. India and China traditionally have not had strong regulatory frameworks for workplace safety. Clothing, gloves and eye protection have been taken up by companies in these regions. More complex technical equipment has still to catch up.

Respiratory equipment business for the company.

CleanSpace respirators are currently being used by leading chemical companies in Europe and Asia. The company has seen growth driven by employers’ identifying the benefits in safety and performance of the CleanSpace technology. In particular, CleanSpace’s compact and lightweight design facilitates staff mobility and portability – an important feature considering the heavy requirements for protective clothing in the chemical industry.

Consumable covers, minimal parts and the IP rating 66 make cleaning, decontamination and maintenance easy and manageable for large sites.

Innovations by the company.

CleanSpace is a revolution in respiratory protection. The design and AirSensit technology platform, that has created the world’s smallest powered respirator, has led to a paradigm shift in how companies and employees think about PAPRs. Now a respirator offers high protection, comfort and easy donning/doffing. The company, with its heritage in the medical device industry, is driven by continuous improvements for performance, wearer comfort and usability.

Our product development is shaped by customer feedback and requirements for compatibility with existing PPE.

Challenges faced in the respiratory solutions market.

OSHA requires wearers to be clean shaven when using tight fitting respirators. With fashion and cultural trends for facial hair, this has presented an issue for employers. The effectiveness of negative pressure disposable masks and reusable masks are significantly reduced with facial hair. The increased use of quantitative fit testing such as porta-count testing has also increased the awareness of the proper fit for protection.

Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

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JOBS QC Chemist Company: Huntsman Date Posted: 04 July Country: India City: Mumbai

Senior Scientist

Company: Momentive Performance Materials Inc Date Posted: 30 June Country: India City: Bangalore

Sr Research Scientist - HVC Company: Reliance Industries Limited Date Posted: 11 July Country: India City: Navi Mumbai

Fluid Structure Interaction Researcher Company: Shell Technology Centre Date Posted: 07 July Country: India City: Bangalore

Production Associate Company: AkzoNobel Date Posted: 14 July Country: India City: Thane

Analytical Chemist

Company: Lubrizol Corporation Date Posted: 10 July Country: US City: Bethlehem

Job Description: The Senior Scientist’s role is to be part of Coatings technology team supporting PSA for medical applications and responsible for design and development of new silicone based formulations for the coatings portfolio for PSA medical applications till commercialization.

Job Description: Manage a set of assigned research tasks including benchmarking of targets, compilation of research data related to the assigned research and development processes while meeting time targets and ensuring regulatory compliances including ISO, NABL and internal management system. Manage and execute lab and scale-up activities for R&D, cost reduction, value addition and new invention where activities involve synthesis, analytical testing & methodology creation, formulation & product development.

Job Description: This is a position in the Fluid Flow & Reactor Engineering R&D team of Shell Bangalore. Researchers in this team will cover a variety of specific knowledge areas. These specialties are key to the overall delivery capability of the team. The following specialties reside within the global team: fluid flow systems; physical and numerical modelling; reactor engineering; reaction engineering; multiphase flow and heat transfer and fluid structure interaction.

Job Description: Production Associate of Akzonobel should perform the production work according to the production order issued to the plant - from receipt of production order, study of the order, pre-batch, charging, production, QC sampling, packing, labeling, perform all the related work order confirm step like record the production timing, signature on the worksheet, report the input/output into the work order etc.

Job Description: As a member of the Lubrizol team, the chemist will be engaged in important, exciting and socially relevant projects. The analytical laboratories are a great place to work and provide a fast-paced environment with a variety of responsibilities, technical challenges and opportunities.

Product Manager (m/f)

Job Description: This position’s main role is to work with customers, R&D engineers and application chemists to lead the definition and development of new products from a marketing perspective and applying professional knowledge about chromatography in an inspiring marketing environment to launch and represent new (U) HPLC solutions successfully.

Principal Scientist, Electrochemistry Company: Johnson Matthey Battery Systems UK Date Posted: 07 July Country: UK City: Milton Keynes

Job Description: : Principal Scientist will provide support to the business and engineering teams in the ongoing battery system production and test, and new commercial technology evaluation. Management of group resource, facilities and capabilities to deliver against above projects on time and as per budget. Perform trouble shooting and problem resolution activities requiring an in depth understanding of cell chemistry and technology, and battery manufacturing processes.

Research Scientist Electrochemistry (m/f) Company: BASF SE Date Posted: 15 July Country: Germany City: Ludwigshafen

Job Description: Within our Process Research and Chemical Engineering research unit, the scientist will take on responsibility for research and development work in the field of materials development for electrochemical storage and extensive cooperation with internal partners from the fields of R&D. Also marketing and production will be an essential element of the work.

Laboratory Technicians Company: Mitsui Chemicals Inc Date Posted: 15 July Country: Singapore City: Jurong Island

Job Description: Reporting to the laboratory supervisor, this position will perform all laboratory testing and ad-hoc analyses in the manufacture of alpha-olefin copolymers.

Company: Agilent Technologies Date Posted: 12 July Country: Europe City: Global

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Job Description: : QC chemist’s tasks will be analysing process samples of ETP plant, treated effluent samples, water samples, outlet sample for consent parameters and calibration of lab instruments, documentation of lab results, among others.

Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

PRODUCTS

Introducing barrier adhesive for flexible packaging T

he Dow Chemical Company launched a brand-new adhesive solution which will help to maximize resource efficiency, favourably influence packaging cost, enhance recyclability and optimize the shelf-life of food packaging. Dow’s innovative ADCOTETM L86-500 barrier adhesive enables the replacement of PET, metallized and aluminium-based packaging structures with an all-polyolefin solution which is easily recyclable in existing processes. This latest innovation meets the demand of flexible packaging industry players looking for more sustainable and effective medium barrier packaging. ADCOTETM L86-500 barrier adhesive designed for medium barrier applications, can provide additional protection against oxygen and moisture.

Contact: Dow Europe GmbH Bachtobelstrasse 3, 8810 Horgen, Switzerland Tel: +41 044 728 2111 Email: info@dow.com Web: www.dow.com

New two-component adhesive for flexibility in production

D

ELO offers DELO-DUOPOX SJ8665, a two-component adhesive that provides flexibility and reliability in the production of electric motors. This impact-resistant epoxy resin can be used in a medium temperature range, making it ideal for bonding surface magnets that are subject to sudden loads and fixing stator laminations to housings.

DELO-DUOPOX SJ8665 has a medium viscosity and offers increased strength, with 16 MPa on aluminum at 80°C and double tensile shear strength compared to standard twocomponent epoxy resins. Bond strength remains the same, even after 1,000 hours of being stored at 85°C with 85 percent humidity, and shows only a slight decrease after storage in chemicals like gasoline or gear oil. The new adhesive easily cures at varying times and temperatures, helping make the production process as fast and flexible as possible.

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Contact: DELO Industrial Adhesives DELO-Allee 1, 86949 Windach, Germany Tel: +49 8193 9900-0 Fax: +49 8193 9900-144 Email: info@delo.de Web: www.delo-adhesives.com

Latest addition to internal pipe coating line

A

xalta Coating Systems introduced the latest addition to its hightemperature, corrosion resistant internal pipe coatings with the release of Nap-Gard® 7-0016, a thermosetting epoxy powder that is designed to provide excellent chemical resistance in temperatures up to 150°C (302°F). Nap-Gard 7-0016 is a good option for customers who need corrosion protection in severe downhole environments. The environments explored by oil and gas operators today have higher temperatures and concentrations of hydrogen sulfide (H2S), carbon dioxide (CO2), and other gas contaminants. These conditions require the use of costly metal chrome alloys to avoid pipeline corrosion and failure. Axalta’s new generation of high-temperature coatings offer a low cost alternative to protect the internal diameter of the world’s pipelines.

Contact: Axalta Coating Systems Suite 3600, 2001 Market Street, Philadelphia, PA 19103, USA Tel: +1 855 547 1461 Email: info-Global@axaltacs.com Web: http://www.axaltacs.com

4-5 October 2017 Barcelona

Science, Industry and Society Inspiring the Future The world is changing, leading to different societal challenges and creating new opportunities.

The World Chemical Summit is a unique event that brings together decision makers, thought leaders and key influencers to discuss the role of chemistry in providing solutions to societal challenges.

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Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

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71

EQUIPMENT POWDER WETTING MACHINE

DISPERSING

WITH LIGHTER TOUCH

BY OLIVER DUDAK AND DOMINIK SEEGER

W

ith a powder wetting machine light filler materials such as expanded and expandable Microspheres can be easily inducted and dispersed dust and loss free.

This saves cost and can produce products with improved properties.

Light filler materials are always applied when it is required to reduce the weight of coatings. In addition, certain light fillers can facilitate the application, shorten drying times, vary the haptics of coated surfaces and cause some matting effect. On the other side, these light fillers are very dusty and difficult to wet and disperse.

Its extremely low specific weight and the high specific surface – which in extreme cases may exceed 100,000 m²/kg – use of conventional dispersing methods such as dissolvers or stirrers very often result in an ordeal or becomes a game of pure chance.

A special powder wetting and dispersing machine may eliminate this problem by dust and loss free handling of these light filler materials. The combination of a powder wetting machine and light filler materials provides a very high potential of rationalising as well as the possibility to produce systems with improved properties.

Besides the issues with related dust, very often an insufficient use of the raw materials to achieve the required result is given and much more raw material has to be used to achieve the required effect as normally would be necessary with a complete wetting of the powder.

A fraction of the powder “disappears” as dust in the environment, exhaust and filter systems. Powders that are sticky or fast swelling, build up crusts at the wall of the vessel and other devices installed in the same vessel (eg. mixing shaft of the stirring device).

Agglomerates build up and can be destroyed only by applying increased energy and additional time.

Dust and loss free dispersing The Conti-TDS powder wetting and dispersing machine is completely different to the systems to be found on the market. With this machine, light filler materials may be inducted dust and loss free from a bag, BigBag or silo directly into the liquid and become wetted and dispersed immediately.

The machine works according to the rotor-stator principle. The machine is not placed inside but outside the vessel and connected to the same with a piping system. Similar to a pump, the liquid in the tank is circulated in a loop.

Because of the special geometry of the rotor, the liquid builds up a vacuum inside the dispersing chamber. This vacuum is used to induct powder dust and loss free into the liquid stream directly from bags, BigBags or silos. (Pic. 1)

Powder versus liquid If fine powders are poured onto a liquid that has only a few square meters of surface area, then - independent from the contamination of the dust – an enormous discrepancy of the surface of the liquid to the surface of the powder is given. The powder floats on top of the surface of the liquid and can only be incorporated into the liquid by the use of high turbulences (to form a Vortex) and the resulting air incorporation. The quality of the product suffers and may be different from batch to batch.

72

Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

Pic.1 - Principle of the function of the Conti-TDS powder induction, wetting and dispersing machine

Inside the dispersing chamber high shear energy is applied to the liquid stream and the surface of the liquid is strongly expanded to take the powder that is inducted. In the same way, the powder is transported via vacuum and reaches the dispersing chamber expanded as well, and the distance in-between the particles is enlarged. Both streams (liquid and powder) reach the dispersing chamber in separate streams and come together into the dispersing chamber and are dispersed with a defined shear gradient. This results in an ideal prerequisite for the wetting of the individual particles. This procedure allows the fine distribution of the components in the moment of the wetting and in many cases an improvement of the properties of the product can be achieved compared to the conventional powder addition systems.

Different to this, the powder wetting and dispersing machine provides a great advantage.

The powder is inducted directly into the liquid stream. The powder immediately becomes wetted in the dispersing chamber and then transferred into the vessel below the surface of the liquid. The risk of an explosion thus is eliminated.

Dispersing of micro spheres Expancel Microspheres that under temperature may be expanded to flexible hollow spheres with a very low density have been established as an alternative filler agent. They serve as a physical expanding agent and are applied in any application where low density and high compressibility is an issue. They offer additional advantages such as matting properties and the product is available in already expanded Microspheres.

This provides different applications for these micro spheres, such as for the “Expancel” micro spheres. When handling these extremely light powders, the advantages of the described machine for the dust and loss free dispersing fully apply. With a special induction device the powder is inducted directly from a bag (see Pic. 2)

For high viscosity products as well Besides lacquers and paint a number of low to high viscosity products can be handled with this machine. In this case the product is transported by the powder wetting and dispersing machine itself and this provides powder transportation or extraction without the use of any additional equipment.

Only for extremely high viscosity products - such as sealing and insulation material, glue, resin, modelling or filling compounds - an additional volumetric pump has to be installed.

Depending on the recipe, several different powders may be dispersed one after the other through a common inlet or multiple inlets for various containers and or bags.

Pic.2 - Induction of the expandable micro spheres from a bag

When the powder induction is finalised and with the powder valve closed, a high pumping rate can be used to apply additional dispersing to the product until the particle size distribution has been achieved or until the dissolving process is finished. Powders that are sensitive to shear energy or that might increase the viscosity (thixotropic agent, matting agent, Microspheres) are mainly inducted at the end of a process.

or a silo into the liquid (eg. into a ready made lacquer system) and immediately dispersed without any agglomerates and with a narrow particle size spectrum finely distributed.

Even further, during the dispersing and wetting procedure the enclosed micro air bubbles are separated from the surface of the solid particles and results in a colloid wetting of the particles in the dispersing chamber. The separated micro air bubbles coagulate and thus can evaporate even from products that are difficult to de-aerate. This effect strongly contributes to the de-aeration of the product. Different to the dispersing of powders with the dissolver, the powder incorporation is independent from the operator. Because of this defined process, the matting effect caused by the Microspheres can be set and repeated from batch to batch. The quality of the product is constant and the properties of the Microspheres are used very effectively.

Protection against possible explosion and health risk

Raw material costs have become a central issue in the field of paints and lacquer. Especially the strong increase of TiO2 and different binders in the past had a negative impact on margins.

Working at an open vessel with a dissolver mixer or a stirrer involves a certain risk, especially when manual adding the powders. Vapours of the solvents on top of the liquid together with the oxygen out of the powdery material build up an explosive mixture. If the powders are static prone, during pouring into the vessel the powder may create an ignition source due to static discharge.

Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

How is it possible to reduce costs without sacrificing quality?

One possibility could be the use of Expancel Microspheres.

Reduction of Density and net weight Even small amounts of “Expancel” reduce the density of a solvent-/ waterbased lacquer system significantly. Compare to conventional lightweight fillers, “Expancel” with density of 0.024 g / cm³ - 0.07 g / cm³ are usually much lower. A volume increase between 20 – 30 percent is not uncommon. This strong increase in volume helps that solvent based paint-/ lacquer systems are automatically VOC-conform. If you add into a normal standard based

73

roughly 2 pbw of “Expancel”, it is possible to reduce the density to 1.22 g / cm³.

(Pic. 3) Although the net weight of 12 l bucket paint with 18 kg went down to 14 kg.

This will give a huge benefit in transportation, but also an increase in productivity of the area to be painted in l / m².

Reduction of costs for material Microspheres can help that less binder is needed in the recipe, because the volumetric oil absorption is very low. In that case an increase in Pigment Volume Concentration (PVC) can be achieved without affecting the quality.

Kostenersparnis

interior dispersion paint, with density of 1.55 g / cm³,

% 0 2,5 5 7,5

0

1

4

Dichte 1,6 1,5 1,4

Raw material costs per liter for interior paint can be reduced by 3-5 percent and for exterior paint

1,1

1,3 1,2 1

0

1

up to 7 percent (Pic. 4).

VOC (volatile organic compounds) is one source of increase the world level of ozone.

3

Pic.3 - Density reduction with Expancel in standard Paint formulation (principle is valid for all standard formulations)

While “Expancel” gives very good matting properties in the recipe, it is also possible to reduce the standard matting agent (e.g silicon dioxide).

VOC compliance

2

Expancel 461 WE 40 d36 in % auf Gewicht

2

3

4

Expancel 461 WE 40 d36 in Gewichts-%

Pic.4 - Cost reduction of raw material due to volume increase (principle is valid for all standard formulations)

Therefore all members of the European Union committed in the VOC directive from 1999 that they have to reduce the VOC emission dramatically.

The last VOC directive (2004/42/EC) has exacerbated these limits again.

Today you’ll find a lot of solvent lacquer systems on the market based on “Expancel”, to reduce VOC. Because of the low density of the microspheres 0.07 g / cm³ - 0.036 g / cm³ (depending on the grade), it is possible while adding 1-2 pbw to increase the volume roughly between 20 – 30 percent.

The required VOC limits are exceeded significantly.

“Expancel” Microspheres can do more than just reduce the density. When using Microspheres in standard formulations, the vapor permeability can be optimized.

(Pic. 5) These hydrophobic properties of the Microspheres contributes that the water absorption is reduced and thus greatly delaying the degradation of the paint film (Pic. 6).

Authors: Oliver Dudak is Sales Manager Expancel at Akzo Nobel Chemicals GmbH and Dominik Seeger is Head of Strategic Sales Development at ystral gmbh.

74

Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

Pic.5 - Water vapour permeability can be improved when using Expancel and the right PVC (principle is valid for all standard formulations)

Px 10-13 6 5 4 3 2

0

0,5

1 1,5 2 2,5 Zugabe von Expancel 461 WE 40 d36, %

Pic.6 -Water consumption independent of the thickness of the coating, brown: standard coating, orange formulation with expandable micro spheres

EQUIPMENT Detergent mixer to enhance productivity and quality

D

etergent powder manufacturing involves a complex mixing process, which requires a unique mixing equipment. Toshniwal Phauler Mixer is a “mixing� solution for detergent powder manufacturing to achieve good quality products in a safe manner. The single shaft paddle mixer and the special accessory shear maker provision, meet the detergent powder manufacturing process requirements. Some of the benefits include; Eliminating the excessive liquid labsa addition to get the desired active detergent Index value; Low cost energy per ton of mix due to short mixing cycle and Eliminate lump formation in the mixing process resulting saving on reprocessing cost, time and labour etc.

Contact: Toshniwal 267 Kilpauk Garden Road Chennai - 600 010

Tel : 044-26445626 / 26448558 Email : sales@toshniwal.net Web : www.toshniwalindia.com

Modern valve island enhances process reliability

B

urkert introduced its new valve islands AirLINE (Type 8652) for control cabinets and AirLINE Field (Type 8653) for field installation without control cabinets. The valve islands were designed for applications in the pharmaceutical, cosmetics, food & beverage industries as well as for water treatment applications. They offer users adjustable monitoring and diagnostic functions that improve system availability and process reliability, while at the same time enabling preventive maintenance. The valve island 8652 is significantly smaller than its predecessor and therefore fits perfectly into compact control cabinets that can be placed close to the process valves. The valve island communicates via common industrial Ethernet protocols or PROFIBUS DP. Every single valve is hot-swap capable, which means it can be replaced during live operation without shutting down the system.

Contact: Burkert Contromatic Pvt Ltd No M6, Type - II, Thiruvanmyur, Dr Vikram Sarabhai Instronic Estate, Chennai 600041, India

Tel: +91(44) 64625800 Fax: +91(44) 2454 0099 Email: sales.in@burkert.com Web: www.burkert.in

Metal-seated ball valve for fluid slurries, high temperature processes

V

elan’s new Securaseal R-series cast metal-seated ball valve is suitable for most processes with fluid slurries and high temperatures. The R-series cast is designed to meet process industry standards. The new cast product line is available in all sizes and standard trims. Securaseal R-series offers unique features that make it simpler for customers to select, install, and maintain, including: high integrity sealing with fixed downstream seating technology that prevents any unwarranted movements; low emissions with full-size live-loaded API 641 & ISO 15848-1 compliant packing; field-replaceable components providing greater flexibility for potential maintenance; optional easy-to-automate mounting pad with severe service drive-train. The valves are used extensively in applications ranging from delayed coking to hydroprocessing to hydrometallurgy.

Contact: Velan, 7007 Cote de Liesse, Montreal, QC H4T 1G2, Canada

76

Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

Tel: +1 514 748 7743 Fax: +1 514 748 8635 Email: sales@velan.com Web: https://www.velan.com

Directional control valves with high flow rates, widest accessories range

A

SCO’s 502 series joins a family of high-performance sub-base mounted directional control valves (501 series and 503 series) that have higher flow rates; less power consumption; and exceptionally easy onsite installation, configuration and modification. The modular 502 series (18 mm) is a general purpose industrial valve for automation and piloting applications in the automotive and tyre, food & beverage, pharmaceutical and packaging machinery industries. The valve has the flexibility of meeting the ISO 15407-2 standard while maintaining its high-flow characteristics.

In addition, the performance of the 502 series dual-pressure sandwich regulator, plus the accuracy of the company’s Numasizing engineering tool, allow the end user to dramatically reduce compressed air and power consumption.

Contact: ASCO 160 Park Avenue, Florham Park, NJ, 07932, USA Email:info-valve@asco.com Web:http://www.asco.com

Single-use diaphragm valve established on the market

G

EMU, the manufacturer of valves, has established the first controllable single-use diaphragm valve on the market – the GEMU SUMONDO. In addition to a pneumatically operated version, the product range also includes a version with a handwheel for manual operation. With a third diaphragm size, another high-performance member has been added to the product range: the largest valve of its type to-date, with up to 1”. This means that applications can be handled for which higher medium flows and precise controllability are indispensable. Produced and packaged in the cleanroom, the single-use valves comply with all requirements for pharmaceutical processes. In other areas too, such as in research centres and laboratory facilities, the valves become a cost-efficient and safe solution. The risk of cross contamination is considerably reduced, cleaning costs are significantly reduced and plant downtimes are reduced to a minimum.

Contact: GEMU Gebruder Muller Apparatebau GmbH & Co. KG Fritz-Muller-Strabe 6-8, 74653 Ingelfingen-Criesbach, Germany Tel : +49-79 40-123 0 Fax : +49-79 40-123 192 Email: info@gemue.de Web: www.gemu-group.com

Introducing safety valves for hygienic applications

G

oetze with the hygienic series 4000 has launched safety valves made of 1.4404 alloyed stainless steel, which have an entire body made of fully forged metal. The valves are always characterized by a slim design and a compact overall height. A low centre of gravity is also achieved with the pneumatic lifting device integrated between the body and the spring housing. As a result of the larger piston diameter associated therewith, the overall height remains low, larger actuating forces are achieved and the valve has improved stability. The outer surface is very smooth with a surface roughness standard of Ra ≤ 0.8 μm and without open or protruding components, which could impede the complete cleaning. The valves are widely used in food and pharmaceutical industry.

Contact: Goetze KG Armaturen Robert-Mayer-Strasse 21, D-71636 Ludwigsburg, Germany Tel: +49 71 41 4 88 94-60 Fax:+49 71 41 4 88 94-88 Email:info@goetze-armaturen.de Web: www.goetze-armaturen.com

New second generation solvent evaporators

B

iotage announced the launch of three new TurboVap® evaporation systems - second generation systems, which build upon the solid foundations of the historic TurboVap® product line. The new TurboVap® LV, II and EH systems incorporate many new customer driven features and enable end users to switch quickly between the functionality they are presently accustomed to in the classic instruments. Each system has enhanced visibility, a compact design, removable/adjustable nozzles, exchangeable manifolds, evaporation flow gradients and a touch screen interface. The TurboVap® EH system is seamlessly integrated with the Biotage® Extrahera™ and is aesthetically very similar, with similar internal lighting, glass sides & lid, greatly improving sample visibility. It also introduces a series of Multi-Racks that offer greater flexibility in the variety of different tube and vial sizes that can be processed.

Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

Contact: Biotage Box 8, SE-751 03, Uppsala, Sweden Tel: +46 18 56 57 10 Fax: +46 18 56 57 05 E-mail: order@biotage.com Web:http://www.biotage.com

77

ADVERTISING INDEX Everlight Chemical Industrial Corp.

03

Ystral India Pvt. Ltd.

15

Sharplex Filters (India) Pvt. Ltd

35

PRO TECH INTERNATIONAL

Front Inside

Kimberlite Chemicals (India) Pvt. Ltd.

43

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Back Inside

Taiwan Tel: +886 2 27066006 | Fax: +886 2 23263599 http://everlight-uva.com sales-uva@ecic.com.tw

India Tel: +912269409850/60 E-Mail: sales@sharplexfilters.com www.sharplex.com

India Tel: +91 80 42487300 Email: info@kimberliteindia.com www.kimberliteindia.com

India Tel: +91 80 49528787 E-Mail: ranjan@ystralindia.com www.ystral.com

Colorado, USA Tel: +1 970 581-2567 www.protechinternational.net

India Tel: +91 80 42487301 Email: sales@xobber.com www.xobber.com

GLOSSARY PAGE NO Accenture 05 Aditya Birla Group 57 Agilent Technologies 68 Akzo Nobel 68, 74 Alexfert 05 ARC Advisory Group 56 Arkema 08 ASCO 77 Axalta Coating Systems 71 BASF SE 68 Biotage 77 Burkert Contromatic Pvt Ltd 76 Celanese Corporation 08 Central South University 58 Clariant 08, 20 CleanSpace Technology 66 Coromandel International Limited 07 Covestro 33, 38 Dachser Chem-Logistics 05 DCM Shriram Ltd 56 DELO Industrial Adhesives 70 Durr Systems AG 32 Economic Times 06 Expanded Polymer Systems Pvt 05 FCI 05 Fraunhofer Institute for Laser Technology 62

78

Chemical Today Magazine | July 2017

PAGE NO

PAGE NO

Future Market Insights 47 GEMU Gebruder Muller Apparatebau GmbH & Co. KG 77 Geofin Comtrade 05 Ghent University 28 Global Market Insights Inc 52 Go East Advisors GmbH 13 Goetze KG Armaturen 77 Gujarat State Petroleum Corp 06 Henkel Adhesive Technologies India Pvt Ltd 24 Heubach Colour Pvt Ltd 26 Honeywell 18 Huntsman 68 Hymatic Engineering Coy Ltd 18 Johnson Matthey 09, 68 Kansai Nerolac Paints 36 Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory 60 Linde 09 Lubrizol Corporation 68 Maruti Suzuki 05 McGill University 30 Mitsui Chemicals Inc 68 Momentive Performance Materials Inc 68 Oil and Natural Gas Corp 06 PCI Chemicals 44 Persistence Market Research 51, 53

PETRONAS Chemicals Group 22 Premium Coatings & Chemicals (P) Ltd 42 Reliance Industries 07, 57, 68 Reuters 08 Ruhr-Universitat Bochum 59 SCIC 48 Shell Technology Centre 68 SICPA 05 Society for Science & the Public 64 Stratasys 11 Sud-Chemie India Pvt Ltd 21 TCI Powder Coatings 10 The Dow Chemical Company 17, 70 The University of Manchester 58 Toshniwal 76 Tosoh Corporation 09 Transparency Market Research 50 University of Chicago 60 University of Wollongong 61 Velan 76 Vitech Enviro Systems Pvt Ltd

40

Volkswagen AG

05

August Issue

Sector Focus Chemicals Section Surface & Coating

• Pure Acrylic Binders • Styrene Acrylic Binders • VAM Based Binders • Emulsion Thickeners • Dispersants • Acrylic Resins • Coating Additives

Adhesives & Sealants

• Construction Sealants • Pressure Sensitive Adhesives • Speciality Adhesives • Industrial Adhesive • Anaerobic Adhesives • Cyanoacrylate Adhesive • Synthetic Rubber Adhesive • Waterborne Adhesives • Solventborne Adhesives • Hot Melt Adhesives • Reactive Secondary Sealants • Fuel Resistant Industrial Sealants • Silicone Sealants • Construction Adhesives • Co-Polymer Sealants • Polyurethane Sealants

Electroplating

• Aluminum Plating Chemicals • Brass Plating Chemicals • Cadmium Plating Chemicals • Chromium Plating Chemicals • Copper Plating Chemicals • Corrosion Plating Chemicals • Gold Plating Chemicals • Lead Plating Chemicals • Nickel Plating Chemicals • Tin Plating Chemicals • Zinc Plating Chemicals • Palladium Plating Chemicals • Precious Metal Plating Chemicals • Non-Precious Metal Plating Chemicals • Plating Bath Additives •Plating Intermediates • Protective Coatings

Metal Treatment

• De-Greasers • Rust Preventives • Metal Working Fluids • Chromating Agents • Surface Conditioners • Paint Strippers • Metal Finishing Chemicals

Equipment Section Pumps

• Barrel Pumps • Booster Pumps • Canned Motor Pumps • Cantilever Pumps • Centrifugal Pumps • Chopper Pumps • Close Coupled Pumps • Cryogenic Pumps • Diaphragm Pumps • Dosing Pumps • End Suction Pumps • Gear Pumps • Inline Pumps • Magnetic Pumps • Metering and Dye Pumps • Peristaltic Pumps • Piston Pumps • Plunger Pumps • Positive Displacement Pumps • Progressive Cavity Pumps • Rotary Pumps • IScrew Pumps • Self-Priming Pumps • Syringe Pumps •MillsVacuum Pumps

Valves

• Ball Valves • Butterfly Valves • Check Valves • Choke Valves • Control Valves • Diaphragm Valves • Drain Valves • Flush Bottom Valves • Gate Valves • Globe Valves • Jacketed Valves • Needle Valves • Pinch Valves • Piston Valves •Plug Valves • Pneumatic Valves • Pressure Relief Valves • Rotary Valves • Safety Valves • Solenoid Valves

September Issue

Sector Focus Chemicals Section: • Construction • Leather • Electronics • Fertilizers • Solvents

Equipment Section: •

Chemical Process Equipment

June

2017

17

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