BASF, Sinopec to build polyalcohol plant at Nanjing complex in China

BASF and Sinopec will build a new world-scale production plant for neopentylglycol (NPG) at their Verbund site in Nanjing, China, the companies announced on Wednesday.

The plant, with a total annual capacity of about 40,000 tons, is planned to go on stream at the end of 2015. The new NPG plant will benefit from backward integration into the Nanjing Verbund site, allowing high delivery reliability and maximizing efficient use of energy and resources.

“With this project, Sinopec and BASF are fully utilizing their strengths regarding resources, technology, talent and management," said said Wang Jingyi, chairman and general manager of Sinopec YPC and chairman of BASF-YPC. "Furthermore, with this investment, we are building on the core competitiveness of both partners."

NPG is a unique polyalcohol offering superior performance in many end-use applications such as coatings and construction due to its high chemical and thermal stability. It is mainly used as a building block in polyester resins for coatings, unsaturated polyester and alkyd resins, lubricants and plasticizers. 

BASF also has NPG production facilities in Ludwigshafen, Germany; Freeport, Texas; and Jilin, China.

“With this new plant, we are responding to our customers’ growing demand for high-quality neopentylglycol, especially in the Asia Pacific region, and at the same time strengthening our position as the global leading supplier of NPG,” said Sanjeev Gandhi, president of BASF's intermediates division. 

“We have 55 years of experience in manufacturing and supplying neopentylglycol to our customers across a broad range of industries.”