Joint Ventures Likely Basis of European Ethylene Expansion: Substantial additions are being planned to overcome current tight market, but economic factors, including high cost of new crackers, are forcing joint ownership

Economics, including the initial cost of construction as well as the need to avoid overcapacity, are changing the way the European chemical industry approaches its ethylene strategy. The most recent new ethylene cracker built in Western Europe, the Fife ethylene plant commissioned in 1985 in Mossmorran, Scotland, is a joint venture of Exxon Chemical and Shell Chemical. The only new cracker currently under construction in Western Europe is Finaneste's in Antwerp, Belgium—a joint venture between Petrofina of Belgium and Neste of Finland. But now, nearly a dozen other companies have proposed building or significantly expanding crackers, which could raise ethylene capacity in Western Europe from 14.5 million metric tons per year to nearly 19 million metric tons. Although there is general agreement that the industry is running flat out and some more capacity is needed, on the face of it, that massive an increase is an appalling scenario. Only in the past two years has ...