In mid-November, Proviron Basic Chemicals (PBC, Oostende / Belgium) shut down one of its four phthalic acid anhydride reactors at Oostende to implement a catalyst change. Production will be at around 75% of normal capacity for a period of two weeks until the reactor is restarted at the end of November, Raf Jacxsens, CEO of PBC, told Plasteurope.com.

The subsidiary of Proviron Industries (Hemiksem / Belgium; www.proviron.com), producer of additive for plastics and the food industry, has capacity at Oostende to produce 102,000 t/y of phthalic anhydride, feedstock for unsaturated polyester resins. About 60% of annual output here goes into resins production. Part of the process is a 65,000 t/y esterification facility for plasticisers such as dimethyl phthalate (DMP) and diethyl phthalate (DEP).

Recently, Proviron and succinic acid producer Reverdia (Delft / The Netherlands; www.reverdia.com) launched a new product resulting from their cooperation, the dimethyl succinate (DMS) “Provichem 2511 Eco”, a starting material for pigments und UV stabilisers.