By Tan Jie, Research Institute of Maoming PC, Sinopec

Production

China had many new styrene plants launched from 2015 to 2017, including the 240 kt/a of Shandong Yuhuang Chemical (Group) Co., Ltd., 35 kt/a of Sinopec SABIC Tianjin Petrochemical, 280 kt/a of CNOOC Ningbo Daxie Petrochemical Co., Ltd., 300 kt/a of Xinyang Technology Group Co., Ltd., 250 kt/a of Abel Chemical (Jiangsu) Co., Ltd., 80 kt/a of Shandong Lihuayi Weiyuan Chemical Co., Ltd., 80 kt/a of Sinopec Jiujiang Petrochemical Company, 120 kt/a of Zhejiang Ningbo Keyuan Plastic Co., Ltd., and 500 kt/a of Qingdao Alkali New Material Technology Co., Ltd. In 2017, the total capacity of styrene in China reached 9.144 million t/a, among which 14.43% adopt propylene oxide-styrene route, 1.48% pyrolysis gasoline extraction and 84.09% ethylbenzene dehydrogenation process. The main manufacturers of styrene in 2017 are shown in Table 1.

  Table 1   Main manufacturers of styrene in China in 2017

Import & export

   China has been importing large amounts of styrene recently due to the shortness of the supply. The import volume in 2017 was 3.2122 million tons, a decrease of about 8.18% year-on-year. China also exports styrene at a small amount, and the export volume in 2017 was 63.4 kt. China's major import origins of styrene are Korea, Japan, Saudi Arabia, Taiwan, and the United States. Korea has been the largest import supplier and the shipments from Korea in 2017 was 1.1374 million tons, accounting for 35.41% of the total imports, down 7.18% year-on-year. The one with the largest change was UAE, and the imports from there increased significantly to 145.7 kt in 2017, accounting for 4.53% of the total, an increase of 100.96%.

Consumption

   With the increasing consumption of polystyrene and ABS resins, the apparent consumption of styrene has increased in China recently, reaching 9.9488 million tons in 2017, an increase of 1.05% YoY. In the next few years, with the steady development of industries such as automobiles, synthetic rubber, coatings, electronic appliances and real estate, the demand for styrene will keep increasing steadily. It is expected that the total demand for styrene in China will reach about 10.5 to 11 million tons by 2022. ABS resin and GPPS/HIPS are sectors with the fastest growth, the proportion of EPS will decrease and there will not be big changes in other downstream fields.

Development

   In the next few years, China will still have several sets of styrene facilities completed and put into production, mainly including Anhui Haoyuan Group’s 260 kt/a line, Shandong Shengyun’s 200 kt/a line, Abel Chemical’s 250 kt/a Phase II, Jingmen Petrochemical’s 80 kt/a Phase I, Dongming CITIC Guoan Ruihua’s 200 kt/a line, Fujian Gulei Petrochemical’s 550 kt/a plant, CNOOC & Shell 630 kt/a plant, Wanhua Group’s 650 kt/a line, Kunpeng Petrochemical’s 700 kt/a unit, Huizhou Yikesi’s 50 kt/a line, Maoming Shihua’s 250 kt/a unit and Sinochem Quanzhou’s 260 kt/a plant. If all these devices can be launched as planned, it is expected that by 2022, China's styrene capacity will exceed 12 million t/a. At that time, the tightness of supply will be eased, and there may even be excess. As new or expanded capacities are mostly from private companies or joint ventures, the supply pattern of China's styrene will change further, the proportion of state-owned enterprises will gradually decrease, and the proportion of private companies and joint ventures will become larger and larger and who, eventually will become the main suppliers of styrene.