Category Archives: Uncategorized

Sep 07
0

Surfactants Monthy August 2020

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Surfactants Monthly August & Early September 2020 First the ads: Our 2020 surfactants conference, September 16 – 18th  is online and free (free of charge – yes that’s right!). Go to this link and register. You gotta register. Can’t just show up on the day. There is a practical limit to how many people can be accommodated on the platform. I don’t know what that is but we have well over 500 already. Sign up. https://www.icisevents.com/ehome/index.php?eventid=200176800& That’s all the ads I have for you this week. From here on it’s solid red meat – that is news. No music or musings this time. We’ll have some of that at the conference. The news: As expected, Oxiteno had a pretty good second quarter as ICIS reported. Second-quarter operating income was positive versus a loss from the same period in 2019 because sales rose faster than costs (ah yes, that is the way to do it, I’m told). The following shows the company’s financial performance. Figures are in millions of reais (R). Rm Q2 20 Q2 19 % Sales 1,201.0 1,066.3 12.6 Cost of goods 973.1 901.4 8.0 Gross profit 227.9 165 38.1 Operating income 50.1 -7.2 – Source: Oxiteno Oxiteno attributed…

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Aug 02
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Surfactants Monthly – July 2020

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Surfactants Monthly – July 2020 Lots of interesting news this month, essentially all of it coming to us courtesy of ICIS and so, I will plug again their online services. Check them out and subscribe if you like what you see. I get nothing if you do, by the way. I just happen to like those guys as I’ve been working with them now for 10 years on my conferences. Speaking of conferences, our surfactants events this year will be all online in super-high quality digital format. We’ll bring you the same relevant topics and highly original speakers you have come to expect along with a lot of new stuff that we want to try (how about a meditation session for example?).  You will now be a better-informed more highly-educated and just all round better person coming out of these events. But there’s more. The events this year are free. That’s right. It’s not a typo. They are free of charge. No strings attached. We want to support the industry and so we are doing it all absolutely free. You have to register and I encourage you to do so soon as there will be a practical limit to attendees…

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Jul 05
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Surfactants Monthly – June 2020

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Surfactants Monthly – June 2020 Guide to this month’s huge blog post – in order of the sections below: Business – dates for your calendar Musings – thoughts, music videos. You know the stuff we do News – what happened in surfactants in June Guest Posts – from Clariant and Modular Genetics More Musings – there’s a Rush video this month, so keep reading End Business Surfactants Training Course July 14- 16th. This is the first fully online high production value digital offering in the surfactants space. It’ll cost you but it’s worth it. The course focuses on the business of surfactants and is a brand new digital version of the hugely successful course I have taught for 8 years. Sign up here . The 10th World Surfactactants Conference will place – online – September 14 – 16th. Stay tuned for a great announcement about this. It will be unique and I believe you will love it. P2 Presents – Know Your Customer July 9th at 10.00 AM and 2.00 PM. This is free! We go deep into the heart and mind of a cosmetics and makeup consumer. What can we, as ingredient suppliers and brand managers, learn from what…

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Jun 06
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Surfactants Monthly – May (and early June) 2020

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Surfactants Monthly – May (and early June) This May was to have been the month of the 10th ICIS World Surfactants Conference in Jersey City, co-produced by your correspondent. Surfactants X as I called it in those super-bowl daydream moments. I’d alternately assume the personas of Bill Bellichick, Vince Lombardi, Joe Montana, George Best and Tom Brady (“hey Gisele, get in on this selfie with Tiger, Cardi and Oprah!”). Then I’d come to in my study where I’ve been for the last 3 months, with the dog’s head resting on my knee. Fine. I have a big-screen TV now for video calls and have that badge of honor of the modern day ‘net warrior, zoom neck (it’s a thing. Google it). I have a super-hi-def streaming cam that faithfully details every facial imperfection across 14 timezones. A studio mic that detects every prevarication, obfuscation and deflection in my voice. And on top of all this, United has extended my exalted elite status through to the end of ’21. Is this not truly the best of all possible worlds!? The conference did not happen, of course. But stay tuned to this blog. We have some very special things planned for this…

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May 03
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Surfactants Monthly – April 2020

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Surfactants Monthly – April 2020 The news this month, as in other months, comes from ICIS and I continue to encourage you to subscribe, as I do , to their many great services. We’ll get straight into it first and then I’ll follow the news with a brief editorial on COVID, health, wellness and freedom –  accompanied by a couple of American punk rock classics. As you might expect with what is going on in oil markets, the month started with US March ethylene oxide (EO) contracts being settled at a decrease, to the lowest level since summer 2012, on lower upstream ethylene contracts. Contracts are assessed at 46.4-55.9 cents/lb ($1,023-1,232/tonne) FOB (free on board) US Gulf. March feedstock ethylene contracts settled at a decrease of 2.25 cents/lb to 21.75 cents/lb, their lowest level since 2002.   In other unsurprising news: US-based polyurethanes and chemicals producer Huntsman Corp will hit the pause button on mergers and acquisitions (M&A), its CEO said in an interview with ICIS. “Certainly at this point we’re taking a pause just because cash is king. Our first and foremost responsibility to our shareholders is to make sure we have a strong balance sheet,” said CEO Peter…

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Feb 09
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January 2020 – Monthly Review

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January 2020 – Surfactants Monthly Review Highlights of this month, of course, include the ACI annual meeting in Orlando. Many great sessions, some organized, some spontaneous. If you’re expecting Page 6  gossip, of the what-Meghan-told Harry, what Kim wore and what Cardi did, type. Sorry. We don’t do that here. To know all that stuff, you gotta be there. Like a thousand of our colleagues were. This blog is brought to you by Desmet Ballestra. I’ve always wanted to say that. Unfortunately it’s not true. No money changed hands to have me run the ad below. It’s interesting and relevant to the dioxane issue, so I’m putting it in here. And I guess I can say that the dioxane matter was extensively discussed at ACI. It’s a big deal if you’re a sulfonator or a user of ether sulfates in your cleaning products. You can be assured that we’ll have a number of views on this topic at our conference in May. Last month’s editorial on Cardi B and Mother Theresa actually, surprisingly, got some positive feedback, but don’t worry – this blog will be strictly the news until the, clearly marked, final section where we dip into the lyrics…

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Jan 18
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2020 New Year’s Editorial

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2020 – New Year’s Editorial Note to Readers:    Neil Peart died last week, age 67. I’m sad, of course. Also reflective; as I look back, fondly, on 45 years of beautiful, original, technically brilliant and heartfelt music. Readers of the blog and the patient folks who have generously sat through my opening remarks at our conferences, know of my fascination, since the age of 15, with Rush. I love Rush. I remember a few years ago in Jersey City, when I started the day with a study of the evolution of one Rush song. We listened to (a cut from ) the first 1974 recording, then the 1976 live version – and I remember the look on some people’s faces as they thought “oh hell, he’s going to go through the last 40 years, two years at a time!” We didn’t of course and the crowd stuck with me as I used some tortured logic to make all this relevant to our beautiful, original, technically brilliant – and heartfelt – corner of the chemical industry. So it first seemed a bit inappropriate to publish the blog I had largely already written over Christmas for this editorial, about an artist that…

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Jan 05
0

December 2019 – Monthly Review

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December 2019 – Monthly Review Strictly the news this month. If I have time, I’ll publish a year-end editorial some time in the coming week. As always, most of the news content here comes courtesy of ICIS and what you see here is just a fraction of what is available if you subscribe. I do and you should consider it also: (https://subscriber.icis.com/). End of commercial. Right at the beginning of December, Huntsman told ICIS that its propylene oxide (PO) and methyl tertiary butyl ether (MTBE) units remained down ]following an explosion at a neighbouring butadiene (BD) complex owned by TPC Group. Huntsman’s PO plant has a capacity of 240,000 tonnes/year, and it produces tertiary butyl alcohol (TBA) as a byproduct, according to the ICIS Supply & Demand Database. TBA is dehydrated to produce MTBE. Huntsman’s MTBE capacity is 650,000 tonnes/year. “Although the PO/MTBE unit was not damaged, it remains idled for the time being because of certain dependencies with the adjacent site that was damaged by the fire,” Huntsman said in a statement. The company did not elaborate on the nature of those dependencies. Huntsman is waiting to get access to the TPC site and is reviewing alternative ways to bring…

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Nov 03
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Surfactants Monthly Review – October 2019

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Surfactants Review- October 2019 October was notable for a few things. First for our 3rd Indian surfactants conference in Mumbai. Second for the denoument of a major (non-surfactant related) scandal I’ve been following (WeWork) and third for the completion of a major project I’ve been working on, which it looks like I won’t be able to talk about until next month’s blog, because the actual press release isn’t out yet. So – this just to remind you that we don’t publish behind the scenes news or gossip here. Everything here is already public domain. Of course, the opinions, I like to think, are original, but even there, we stand on the shoulders.. right? Nonetheless we have a few interesting snippets of news for the month. Here we go. First some economics: All businesses involved in international trade should be aware of the wider impact of the current trade war on economic activity. The Wall Street Journal noted in an opinion piece titled “Adam Smith’s Revenge” a few days ago “The great counterfactual of the Trump Presidency is how much faster the economy would be growing without the damage of his trade protectionism. Wednesday’s report of lackluster 1.9% growth in the…

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Sep 28
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Surfactants Monthly Review – September 2019

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September Monthly Surfactants Review Last month’s blog attracted a lot of very positive feedback. Thanks for that. The story of Tony Service certainly seems to have inspired many people and that makes me feel very good, for obvious reasons. Now, Tony was in the commercial field. There are clearly Tonys or Tonyas or Rishis out there who are in manufacturing, finance, R&D, whatever. Have you ever known one? If you’d like to share the story, I and the blog readers would love to hear it, I’m sure. Please get in touch. Let’s see if we can make this a periodic feature. What would you be like if you worked to become the Tony Service of your field / industry / hobby?   Now the news; provided largely by the good folks at ICIS. If you like this information, you should subscribe to their service, like I do. The month started with news of the Q4 fatty alcohol contract negotiations from ICIS’s Judith Taylor as she reported that US mid-cut fatty alcohols were mixed as contract negotiations were slowly emerging for Q4 business. Judith noted that several producers were looking at potential rollover from Q3 prices. A few buyers considered this…

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Sep 02
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Surfactant Monthly Review – August 2019

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Monthly Blog August 2019 Back to work. Back to School. Back on the Road. September. Time to execute what you’ve been thinking about all summer. If it you don’t do it now, it won’t get done, because you don’t want it enough. Let someone else who wants it succeed… sorry I’ve been listening to motivational lo-fi hip hop all summer. It gets a bit intense. More about that later. Some folks didn’t wait until the end of the summer. Oxiteno’s parent, Ultrapar is now looking at opportunities for investments in Brazil’s refining sector. The company,during Ultrapar’s Q2 earnings call, pointed to changes in Brazil’s oil and gas value chain in the wake of Petrobras’ exit from the refining business, along with divestments of Petrobras natural gas infrastructure assets. Any investment by Ultrapar would depend on opportunities to integrate refining with its downstream fuels distribution and storage businesses. The company is active in fuels and liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) distribution, and in bulk liquids storage – through its Ipiranga, Utragaz and Utracargo businesses. As for Oxiteno, it looks like they had a bit of a rough quarter. Figures are in millions of reais.  As ICIS reported right at the beginning of…

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Jul 05
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Independence Day – 2019

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Surfactants Blog – Independence Day 2019 Happy Independence Day! I’ve written this before, but I love it so much, here it is again. Today is right up there with Christmas, Easter, Passover et al for me. Honestly, I woke up this morning with genuine excitement, like a kid anticipating presents. Today it was announced, to a candid world, that all men are created equal. Stop and think about that. A radical idea for the time and in fact, still radical in many parts of the world today. Now, certainly you could argue that the idea was not new in 1776 and that the Hebrew scriptures, the new testament and other texts had asserted much the same thousands of years prior. But here was a rebel bunch of colonies standing up to the world’s superpower and saying something that surely resounded through the palace of Westminster and beyond. You can imagine the great and the good, the crowned heads of Europe, spitting out their port, exclaiming “all men are created .. what!?!? – you gotta be kidding me!”. Outrage, mirth, contempt, maybe a little prescient dread formed regarding this radical concept dumped, like a rotting fish, into their well ordered drawing…

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May 06
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Surfactants Monthly Review – April 2019

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Surfactants Monthly Review – April 2019 Most Influential Can I remind you briefly here that My surfactants conference coming up in May, is covering covering bio-surfactants, digitalization, EO, EOD’s and the campus opportunity for ethoxylators. We have Estee Lauder, Exxon and every type of company in between. Along with hundreds of your colleagues, this is the authentic world surfactants experience, complete with our third exclusive awards ceremony at which we recognize the best, brightest and most accomplished. Please don’t miss out as we once again fill the Jersey City Hyatt for 3 glorious days of surfactants business. I’ll see you there. End commercial. Start of the news for April. I’m going to be upfront with you here. We have strictly the news in this edition and it is crisp and edited right down to the basics. I just don’t have time right now for the usual music, pop culture and departures into Kardashian-land. More of that next month, I’m sure. The talented and knowledgeable, Judith Taylor at ICIS notes at the beginning of the moth that US second-quarter C12-15 mid-cut fatty alcohol contracts remain under downward pressure. Finished business for the mid-cuts is largely at a drop from the first…

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Apr 03
0

Surfactants Monthly March 2019

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Surfactants Monthly Review – March 2019 Authenticity Occasionally in these columns, I like to riff on a word that has appeared suddenly in the popular lexicon. These days, apparently, the highest accolade that can be bestowed upon a person or company is that they are authentic. Authenticity beats the seven cardinal virtues all the way to the metaphorical bank. To paraphrase Groucho Marx, if you can fake authenticity, you’ve got it made. Who or what, then is authentic and how did they achieve such exalted status? For more thoughts on authenticity, read, don’t skip, to the end of the blog. In the meantime, though you know what’s authentic? My surfactants conference coming up in May, covering bio-surfactants, digitalization, EO, EOD’s and the campus opportunity for ethoxylators, Estee Lauder, Exxon and every type of company in between. Along with hundreds of your colleagues, this is the authentic world surfactants experience, complete with our third exclusive awards ceremony. Please don’t miss out as we once again fill the Jersey City Hyatt for 3 glorious days of surfactants business. I’ll see you there. End commercial. Start of authentic news. The month started off with news from the biotech front. REG told ICIS that…

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Mar 05
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Surfactants Monthly Review – February 2019

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Surfactants Monthly Review – February 2019 Surprising and Unexpected Those accustomed to inventing things in the course of their work, or as a hobby, will be familiar with the concept of “surprising and unexpected”, particularly in the field of chemistry. If your invention is to be judged innovative and not obvious (the most insulting charge that can be leveled against a putative invention) then it helps if your observation of a chemical reaction or its outcome yields a result that is surprising and unexpected. Hanging around P2, (11 granted patents, 20-odd in the pipeline) I am constantly encountering surprising and unexpected things in the lab and pilot plant. Every now and then I will even contribute to the surprise myself (OK once, I got to invent something, US Pat. 10,071,944). Of course not everything surprising and unexpected is inventive, sometimes tragedies result which can shape history, ultimately for the better as the Hindenberg disaster helped hasten the advance of airplane travel. Thus aiding one, much safer, innovation (the airplane) at the expense of another (the short-lived airship). By the way, the level of interest in our upcoming World Surfactants Conference in May in NYC has turned out to be surprising…

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Feb 10
0

Surfactants Monthly – January 2019

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Surfactants Monthly Review – January 2019 Can I ask you a favor before you read any further. Take a look at our surfactants value chain survey and fill it out. This year, we have some new questions and many old ones (so we get the same great time series data). Survey Link: https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/NDDLM2R One more favor: Think about and nominate some companies or people for our 2019 Surfactants Awards. The winners and finalists will be recognized at a really great, inspiring and incredibly well attended, reception at the Jersey City Grand Hyatt at the end of the first day of our conference on May 16th. Link: https://www.icisevents.com/ehome/worldsurfactants/awards/ By the way, readers of the blog can save, I am told, $300 off the registration fee for the conference, if you enter this code WSC19NBblog when you register here: https://www.icisevents.com/ereg/newreg.php?eventid=200178918 End of commercials. Beginning of blog. Last month saw the (real) ACI meeting in Orlando. Outstanding. Record recent attendance and a thoroughly good time. Thanks to the staff and volunteers. It’s a great way to start the year. And we humbly offer to take you through the rest of year with our events in Jersey City, Europe, India and Singapore. For highlights…

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