-Canadian Natural Resources has advanced a planned maintenance shutdown at its Horizon oil sands plant in Alberta to June, Reuters reports. The work, which was originally scheduled for the fall, includes boosting the capacity of the plant’s diluent recovery units and reliability improvements.
-The propylene market is experiencing a revolution on par with the fracking boom due to looming manufacturing changes, Platts reports. An analyst at Wood Mackenzie today said the ramping up of propane dehydrogenation and methanol-to-olefins/propylene technology will boost on-purpose propylene production above 30% of North American output by 2020. On-purpose propylene just passed the 10% mark in North America this year. Dow Chemical, Enterprise Products Partners and Formosa Plastics each have PDH projects in the works.
-Dow has bought out ExxonMobil’s share of a 50-50 joint venture between the two firms that is focused on polyethylene process technology. Dow and ExxonMobil agreed last October to restructure the ownership of Univation Technologies, which is the licensor of UNIPOL PE Process Technology. Dow Vice Chairman of Business Operations Jim Fitterling said the move would add “significant value” to Dow’s plastics portfolio.
-A new natural gas severance tax proposed by Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf would cost the state’s economy $20 billion and 6,000 jobs, according to a study by the Associated Petroleum Industries of Pennsylvania (API-PA). API-PA noted that a local impact tax collected from every shale-drilling site in Pennsylvania has generated more than $630 million since 2012. The governor’s proposed severance tax would repeal the impact fee in accordance with state law.
-The oil being transported in a BNSF train that derailed and caught fire in North Dakota yesterday had been treated to reduce volatility, the Associated Press reports. A Hess Corp. spokesman said the oil had been stripped of propane, butane and other gases to comply with North Dakota law. Six cars caught fire in the incident, prompting an evacuation in nearby Heimdal, N.D.
