Hanwha Total Petrochemical Readies New Production Line for Advanced Plastics

Hanwha Total Petrochemical announced its plans for a factory expansion to strengthen the company's synthetic resin business.
 
On December 11th, Hanwha Total Petrochemical approved $331 million¹ to build a new production facility in Daesan, S. Korea to increase its polyethylene (PE) production. The project is slated for completion in late 2019. Once complete, Hanwha Total Petrochemical will be able to increases its annual PE production capacity by 400,000 tons from its current 720,000 tons to 1.12 million tons. The increase represents not only an overall change to capacity but also a pivot for the company to manufacture a greater range of high value-added advanced plastic products.
 
The production facility will adopt a new a production method called ADL to manufacture advanced PE products as part of Hanwha Hanwha Total Petrochemical's plans to reorganize its synthetic resin business to focus on high value-added plastics.
 
As the name implies, ADL or Advanced Double Loop is a process that uses two catalysts and two successive loop reactors to produce a wide spectrum of high value-added products with diverse specifications. One example is advanced mPE used in pipes and fuel tanks. Metallocene Polyethylene (mPE) requires metallocene catalysts to produce advanced plastic that possesses greater rigidity and transparency. Another example is HDPE, an advanced plastic used to manufacture a variety of films, plastic containers and other plastic-based products.
 
The new production line will also enable the catalyst to be switched in less than 24 hours, reducing the time needed to prepare the line to produce different grade of plastic. A single extruder can be used to manufacture products of a wide range of colors in addition to transparent plastics, allowing production to respond nimbly to changing customer needs and demands.