Malaysia’s Titan restores full runs at Pasir Gudang naphtha crackers

26-Aug-13

Malaysia-based Lotte Chemical Titan has fully restored operations at its 720,000 tpa naphtha cracking complex in Pasir Gudang following an outage in early August, as per Reuters. A 440,000 tpa cracker was restarted around mid-August, while the smaller 280,000 tpa unit resumed operations earlier this week. Japan’s JX Nippon Oil's 404,000 tpa cracker located at Kawasaki remains shut following an outage around Aug. 18. The unit is not expected to resume operations anytime before end August. The naphtha feedstock market has been under pressure recently as North Asian buyers now have the option of purchasing cheaper alternative liquefied petroleum feedstock to replace a small portion of the light fuel.