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Permalink Reply by Skip Peel - Mineral Consultant on December 21, 2013 at 4:25

Axiall considers La. for $3 billion ethane plant

Associated Press

BATON ROUGE — Axiall Corp. is considering building a $3 billion eth­ane cracker and chemical plant somewhere in Loui­siana.

The Atlanta-based chemical manufacturer said it could make a deci­sion early next year. Axi­all would invest $1 billion of its own money, while an unnamed partner would put in $2 billion. The plant could open in 2018, creating 225 perma­nent jobs. An estimated 2,000 to 3,000 construc­tion jobs would be created over four to five years.

Louisiana Economic Development officials said they’ve offered Axi­all a “competitive, perfor­mance- based incentive package” but did not pro­vide details.

Axiall said it wants to make at least half its own ethane-based chemicals that it uses to make vi­nyls instead of buying them from others.

The company has Louisiana plants in Lake Charles and Pla­quemines where it em­ploys 1,600. “While we are still considering a number of options and potential partners for the project and we have not yet re­ceived final investment approval from our board of directors, we have narrowed our sit­ing choices to Louisi­ana,” CEO Paul Carrico said in a statement. “We are excited about the prospect of expanding our footprint in the state and continuing to invest in Louisiana and its talented work force.” The company said it plans to pursue permits and begin engineering work while awaiting a final decision. If built, the plant would be another in a wave of tens of billions of dollars in chemical investments in Louisiana, driven largely by the cheap and abundant natural gas that’s being drilled out of formations, including the Haynesville Shale, by hydraulic fractur­ing.

Sasol North America, for example, plans a similar ethane cracker and deriva­tives plant in Lake Charles, with plans to spend more than $5 billion. Westlake Chemical Corp. plans an ex­pansion of its own ethane cracker in Lake Charles. And Dow Chemicals re­started its shuttered ethane cracker in Hahnville late last year.

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