The addition of the facility’s 22,000 t/y output expands the US chemical producer’s downstream polyurethanes capabilities in the Asia-Pacific region by an unquantified margin.  The plant is its first outside the US to produce the polyols sold under the Terol brand name.

In its proprietary process, Huntsman upcycles scrap bottle-grade PET to produce the starting materials for MDI-based polyurethane insulation systems used in polyisocyanurate (PIR) boardstock systems, spray polyurethane foam (SPF) and pour-in-place applications, including entry doors, garage doors, coolers, refrigerators and commercial freezers.

To make the polyols, Huntsman can draw on the equivalent of 1 billion 500-ml PET bottles it processes annually at its Houston, Texas, site.  The company also produces the polyols from scrap PET bottles at its Huntsman Building Solutions site in Boisbriand, Canada.

CEO Peter Huntsman, speaking at the opening ceremony in Taiwan, said that, added to its existing capability, the new facility will allow the company to “participate on a global scale in the shared responsibility to clean up our environment and do more with less.”

Tony Hankins, president of Huntsman’s polyurethanes business and CEO of Asia Pacific, said Taiwan is “a critically important base for achieving the company’s strategic objectives in the region.

Author: Dede Williams, Freelance Journalist