BASF Lays Cornerstone For World’s Largest PolyTHF Plant
Germany-based BASF AG recently laid the cornerstone of its new integrated production facility
for polytetrahydrofuran (PolyTHF®) and tetrahydrofuran (THF) in the Shanghai Chemical Industrial
Park in Shanghai. The new plant, scheduled to be completed in the fourth quarter of 2004, will have
an annual capacity of 60,000 metric tons of PolyTHF and 80,000 metric tons of THF. According to
BASF, when completed, the site will be the largest PolyTHF production facility in the world. The
plant also is BASF’s first wholly owned investment in China.BASF says the facility will supply the
expanding spandex fiber market in China. Andreas Kreimeyer, BASF board member with responsibility
for the Asia Pacific region, says the new plant marks a step towards the company’s goal of
generating 20 percent of sales and earnings in chemical businesses in Asia Pacific, with 70 percent
from local production by 2010. To highlight the product’s advantages to local customers, BASF also
launched a Chinese brand-name for PolyTHF — Bao Li Fu, which means “enrich your fabric.”BASF says
the Shanghai facility is the first plant to use the company’s proprietary technology to convert
butane directly to THF and subsequently to PolyTHF, eliminating the intermediate step of producing
1,4-butanediol (BDO).
Fall 2003