Nippon Oil Corp, one of the top refiners of Japan, has decided to shut its sole naphtha cracker with capacity of around 400,000 ton per year.
Official sources from the Company confirmed the news to Fibre2fashion.com saying, “Yes, we do plan for shut naphtha cracker located in Kawasaki in eastern part of the country, for approximately 20 days, from late December till early January next year, as demand for petrochemicals have collapsed, on the back of global recession.”
Most of the Japanese firms are now running their naphtha crackers at around 80 percent of capacity, with the shrinking demand for ethylene, across the world.
Ehtylene production in Japan fell 17.7 percent in November compared to previous year, marking the lowest level in over 12 years for the month due to output cuts by many firms.