Metallurgy / Chemicals / Rubber & Plastics

At present, more than 20 provinces in China have successively issued new "plastic restriction orders." Under the new trend of alternatives, degradable plastic materials such as PLA, PBAT, PHA, etc. pay attention to attention. At the same time, the large excess capacity of PTA in the future makes PTA companies desperate to find an export for capacity release. Many domestic polyester leaders Enterprises began to try to launch the PBAT project.

Following Constant Force

Another private PTA leader deploys PBAT project

On December 25th last year, Hengli Petrochemical's subsidiary Yingkou Kanghui Petrochemical Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Kanghui Petrochemical") with an annual output of 33,000 tons of PBAT/PBS biodegradable polyester new material project successfully started up at one time and was successfully put into production and production. After the production of qualified products, the production capacity of the project has jumped to the top three in China.

On February 1, 2021, Hengli Petrochemical officially signed a contract with an annual output of 300,000 tons of PBS biodegradable plastics project. So far, Hengli Petrochemical has signed 933,000 tons of biodegradable new material projects, and will build the largest and most productive biodegradable new material production base in China.

Recently, Sanfangxiang’s wholly-owned grandson company, Jiangyin Xingjia Plastics and Chemical Co., Ltd., announced the announcement of the environmental assessment for the first phase of the 40,000-ton biodegradable project. It is understood that the project plans to invest 140 million yuan. After completion, it will form a production scale with an annual output of 40,000 tons of degradable new materials (PBAT chips).

In February 2021, Sanfangxiang Group (600370) made public, its subsidiary Jiangyin Xingjia Plastic Chemical Co., Ltd. plans to construct a PBAT project with an annual output of 120,000 tons. In addition to the above-mentioned project with an annual output of 40,000 tons of degradable new materials, the company will also invest 220 million yuan in the second phase of the 80,000 tons/year PBAT production line and supporting sheet production lines.

PBAT, even Vietnam is desperately catching up!

Recently, as the leading plastics group in Vietnam, An Phat Holdings (stock code: APH) has 15 subsidiaries, it pays close attention to the core business of plastics and has found a new direction through strategic measures: building the largest green in Southeast Asia Material manufacturing plant. The company’s vice chairman believes that although the current supply of green materials is in short supply compared with actual demand, the global green materials market is in a stage of vigorous development. It is expected that in the next 3-5 years, environmentally friendly products will dominate the market and gradually replace traditional products.

In addition, the company also increased the production capacity of PBAT from 20,000 tons to 30,000 tons. In 2019, APH exported green products to five countries. By 2020, this number has quadrupled. They believe that in Vietnam, if only part of the traditional packaging product market is converted to biodegradable resin (PBAT), then the plant to be built will be sufficient to meet domestic production needs. One year after the plant was put into operation, the market output was 30,000 tons.

It is understood that the cost and applicability of the product are the reasons why they choose to invest in PBAT. First of all, the production cost and price of PBAT compound compostable products will be close to traditional plastic products. Compared with other biological materials, the price gap between these two products is the least. Secondly, PBAT is a material that can be industrially produced and can be widely used to produce environmentally friendly compostable products, such as knives, spoons, forks, packaging, etc. Moreover, in the past 20 years of business, packaging products have been their core competitiveness.

China has a huge demand for degradable plastics. At present, China’s annual consumption of degradable plastics is about 550,000 tons, and the market size is about 11 billion yuan. The replacement rate for non-degradable plastics is 1.2%, of which packaging plastics consume 500,000 tons. The consumption of agricultural film plastics is 40,000 tons, and other fields are 16,000 tons. It is estimated that by 2025, the demand for degradable plastics in China will reach 2.25 million tons, and the replacement rate of non-degradable plastics will reach 4.9%, including 2.07 million tons of packaging plastics. , The consumption of agricultural film plastics is 167,000 tons, and other fields are 16,000 tons; by 2030, the total demand will exceed 4 million tons, and the market size will reach 80 billion yuan. BPAT will be the mainstream product in the biodegradable plastics market with broad development prospects.

The PBAT raw material cost accounts for a large proportion. The upstream raw materials are PTA, BDO, and AA. To produce 1 ton of PBAT, 0.4 tons of PTA, 0.43 tons of BDO and 0.35 tons of AA are required. In PBAT production costs, raw material costs account for approximately 72%.

At present, the national PTA production capacity is relatively high. In 2020, the production capacity and output will be 56.96 million tons and 49.38 million tons, respectively, an increase of 17.3% and 10.3% year-on-year. The downstream products of PTA are mainly used for polyester filament (52%), followed by polyester bottle flakes (17%) and polyester chips (14%). With the continuous commissioning of large refineries, the current PTA production capacity of various companies has reached 33 million tons/year, which is about 60% more than the current capacity. As this part of the production capacity will be put into production in the next 3 years, PTA will enter a period of overcapacity.

Percentage of PTA downstream in 2019:

2021-2023 PTA capacity launch plan:

Since PBAT in the biodegradable plastics category is a petroleum-based raw material, PTA needs to be used. PBAT raw materials account for 24% of the biodegradable plastics field. It is roughly estimated that 600,000 of the 2.5 million tons of replaceable volume by 2025 Tons come from PBAT, and the demand for PTA is estimated based on the consumption of 0.48 tons of PTA per ton of PBAT. Although the popularity of biodegradable plastics has little impact on the overall demand for PTA under the overall PTA overcapacity pattern, it has brought certain benefits to the capacity digestion of PTA companies involved in PBAT production. At the same time, for a refining and chemical integration enterprise like Hengli, Hengli Petrochemical is in the layout of crude oil, coal, and degradable materials, and the product profit under the control of cost is more secure.

Domestic PBAT production capacity is expected to hit a new high

It's not easy to share a cup

At present, my country's total production capacity exceeds 200,000 tons, and the under-construction and proposed production capacity reaches nearly 1 million tons. The "Notice on Solid Promotion of Plastic Pollution Control" clarifies that starting from January 1, 2021, shopping malls, supermarkets, pharmacies, bookstores and other places in municipalities, provincial capitals, and cities under separate state planning will provide food and beverage packaging and takeaway services and various types of establishments in urban built-up areas. In the exhibition activities, the use of non-degradable plastic shopping bags is prohibited, but roll bags, fresh-keeping bags and garbage bags are not forbidden for the time being. As a result, degradable materials such as PBAT and PLA have ushered in a broad market space, and the increase in demand has promoted the growth of PBAT production capacity, while also attracting a large influx of industrial capital.

Domestic companies already have PBAT mass production technology. From 2021 to 2022, it is expected that there will be Huafeng Group, Hubei Yihua, Hengli Yulin, Kingfa Technology, Wanhua Chemical, Donghua Tianye, Jindan Technology, Yangmei Pingding, Zhejiang Changhong, Daun Co., Ltd., Shandong Rui More than a dozen projects including Feng, Sanfangxiang, Tongde Chemical Industry, and Inner Mongolia Huaheng released over 2 million tons of PBAT production capacity.