Demand Decline Shocks Polycarbonate and Nylon    

date：2009/6/10

Houston, Texas, USA (May 19, 2009) Decline in demand is likely to keep global polycarbonate and nylon start-up rates around 90% in the near future.

Adrian Beale, global director of engineering resins at chemical market associates Inc., a Houston, Texas based consulting firm, predicts that by 2012, excess polycarbonate capacity, including a large-scale petrochemical facility with a capacity of 259000 tons that Saudi kayam will launch in 2011, will reduce global operating rates to 70% The level of nylon fibers will continue to decline under the competition of polyester fibers.

The decline in demand for CD and DVD has hit the global polycarbonate industry hard.

Previously, optical media was the largest terminal market for polycarbonate. Beale said that as people download more movies and listen to music, soon optical media will no longer be the largest market for polycarbonate applications.

He said that although the advent of Blu-ray DVD technology may bring some help, overall, "will only make polycarbonate demand more orderly decline."

Consumer concerns about BPA content in bottles and other types of packaging will also have an impact on the demand for polycarbonate in this area. The potential growth of polycarbonate may come from automotive parts and sheet and film applications. Beale estimates that the global polycarbonate production capacity in 2008 was about 3.31 million tons.

The polycarbonate market "will need to find an important new application". Beale thinks automotive windowpanes are a good choice, although some improvements in the performance of polycarbonate may be needed in this application.

As for nylon, Beale said the nylon fiber market would continue to decline due to competition from polyester. About 60% of the world's annual output of 2.27 million tons of nylon resin is used by the fiber industry.

The remaining 40% of nylon is used for engineering plastics, which is also in recession due to the slump in the automotive market. Therefore, it is expected that from now on to 2013, the global nylon 6/6 resin start-up rate will remain around 80%, while the nylon 6 resin start-up rate will be slightly lower than this level.

Beale says smaller, more fuel-efficient cars may offer new opportunities for nylon. This kind of car has smaller parts, so it needs more heat-resistant materials. Moreover, with the increase of mileage, more and more attention has been paid to weight loss and metal substitution, which is also helpful to increase nylon demand.

"In the future, it will be engineering resins, not fibers, that will drive the development of nylon materials market," he said.