Paraquat prices rise, pyridine base industry analysis

Date:07-01-2022

Paraquat prices have risen recently. The quotation of 42% TK of paraquat was 27,000 yuan/ton, the transaction price was raised to 26,500 yuan/ton, and the transaction price of 20% SL was raised to 19,000 yuan/kL. The FOB of 42% TK is raised by US$100/ton to 3,500-3,600 US dollars/ton; the FOB of 20% SL has been raised by US$50/kl to 2,280-2,500 US dollars/kl. This article will make a basic review of the pyridine base industry, the core raw material of paraquat.

 

China paraquat price trend

China's pyridine production has experienced a bumpy process for nearly 50 years from coal tar refining in 1950 to the current formaldehyde-acetaldehyde-ammonia production. China's first pyridine synthesis plant, 11,000 tons of pyridine base, was jointly invested by American Reilly and Nantong Acetic Acid Plant in 2001. In 2004, the 12,000-ton pyridine base built by Red Sun Group was successfully driven in Nanjing Chemical Park, marking the rise of China's national industry's self-produced pyridine.

 

 

1. Global main available production capacity, kt/year

 

 

2. The current pyridine base market situation

 

At present, China still needs to import a certain amount of pyridine from India or Japan. Pyridine bases are mainly used for pesticides in the world, accounting for more than 52%, about 40% for pharmaceutical-related uses, and about 8% for others such as butadiene latex. The main pesticide product is paraquat, and diquat mainly consumes pyridine. The current sales of paraquat and diquat also support the upstream pyridine price. Since the pyridine base plant is mainly based on the continuous production of fluidized bed, some emergencies such as bad weather, continuous supply of water, electricity and steam, safety and environmental protection and other aspects are also likely to cause shutdown and maintenance, and the operating rate is relatively low. This further exacerbates the tight supply of pyridine.

 

 

     Figure: Top export destination countries of China's paraquat

 

Due to the high barriers in the pyridine base industry (high technical difficulty, high operating costs, and large equipment investment), during the production of the device, a large amount of 3-methylpyridine and various Alkylpyridines are produced at the same time, the consumption of 3-methylpyridine and other alkylpyridines is more dependent on downstream industries, such as cyanopyridine, nicotinic acid, nicotinamide, prazoles, alkylpyridinium salts, etc. It can also be seen that the operation of a single pyridine base plant if with no industry chain support, such as Sanonda, Taiwan Changchun, Shandong Green Olive, Tangshan Chenhong, etc., have all withdrawn from the production of pyridine base.

 

3. Layout of upstream and downstream industries of Red Sun

 

In the upstream of pyridine base in China, methanol is oxidized to produce formaldehyde, and ethanol is oxidized to acetaldehyde. Fermentation is closely related to agricultural economic crops.

 

The downstream of pyridine base is mainly used for chlorination, ammoxidation, coupling reaction, etc. Globally, after more than 30 years of continuous technological innovation and development.  Red Sun has established complete independent intellectual property rights to directly couple and produce 2,2-bipyridine (diquat raw material, and has applied for 3 PCT patents and 11 Chinese Invention patent) 30,000 tons / year, the new device will be put into operation soon. Another plan of 20,000 tons is under construction, and it is expected that the whole company will reach 50,000 tons/year production capacity early next year.

 

Pyridine chlorination is mainly used in daily chemical fungicides ZPT, SPT industry and intermediates of chlorantraniliprole. Red Sun has built complete independent intellectual property rights (10 Chinese patents have been applied for) 2,3-dichloropyridine with a production capacity of 9000 ton/year and ZPT and SPT units of 6000 tons/year, and in the cyanopyridine and nicotinamide industrial chain, Red Sun also has downstream cooperative factories with a total of 40,000 tons/year units, which are used to consume self-produced 3-Methylpyridine.

 

It is reported that the company is planning to build another 50,000-ton pyridine base project to lay a solid foundation for the later development of the pyridine industry chain.

 

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Erwin Xue

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