Polycarbonate (PC), nylon 6 and nylon 6/6 resins are benefitting from growth in the North American automotive market as manufacturers continue the drive to reduce vehicle weight.
Sam Stewart, sales and distribution vice president with Covestro in the US, said: “There’s still a need for weight reduction, so the average amount of polycarbonate used per vehicle is increasing.”
PC use is rising in automotive interior trim, instrument panels and forward lighting systems, he added.
Another PC end market set to grow in 2016, according to Stewart, is sheet, where PC increasingly is being used in residential construction, commercial restaurants, decorative skylighting and security applications in public buildings. The information technology market also is using more carbon fibre-filled PC in laptop housings.
Global PC demand growth is expected to be 4.5% to 5% in 2016, with North American demand growth for the materials slightly lower at 3.5% to 4%, said Stewart.
“The growth rate [for 2016] will be highest in Asia, but North American growth still will be above GDP,” he added. “We’re really optimistic for next year. The global supply/demand balance is good, and we should see even more balanced global capacity in 2017.”
Along with PC, nylon 6 and 6/6 are selling more material into a North American car market where cars and light truck production surpassed the 17 million mark in 2015. That number roughly has doubled from the 8.6 million level it slumped to in 2009, during the worst of the global recession. Production is expected to be in the 17 million to 18 million range between now and 2020.
“Automotive continues to be our major end use market,” said Richard Mayo, global nylon business director at leading nylon 6/6 supplier DuPont. “What’s happening there is really important as far as driving demand for product.”
Mayo cited auto cam covers, which “still have way to go before being fully penetrated” by nylon 6/6. Even more mature auto applications can be drivers for growth, he added.
“Some applications can take years or decades to make full use of a material. The exciting thing is that the penetration rate in pounds per vehicle has a multiplier effect. That creates a bigger opportunity.”
Outside of North America, DuPont is seeing nylon 6/6 demand growth in consumer electronic items such as smartphones and tablets. DuPont earlier this year increased capacity for high-temperature nylon by 10% at its plant in Richmond in the US and boosted nylon 6/6 capacity by 20% at its plant in Uentrop, Germany.
At the recent Global Plastics Summit 2015 in Chicago, IHS Chemical analyst Paul Blanchard said nylon 6/6 supplies were adequate in North America and the material had a stable price outlook. New capacity has come online in northeast Asia – primarily China – but global nylon 6/6 operating rates should remain around 80% through 2020.
Globally, the 5.3 billion-pound (2.4 billion kg) nylon 6/6 market is led by Ascend Performance Materials with a 21% share and Invista with a 16% share.
The global nylon 6 market, however, is “very fragmented,” Blanchard said, with market leader BASF having only an 8% share. “The idea of discipline in nylon 6 is off the table,” he said. “It’s sort of like the Wild West.”
Large amounts of nylon 6 capacity have been added in China, although Lanxess also has added capacity in Belgium and Honeywell has done the same in the US.
New capacity would lead to lower prices and push global operating rates below 60% for the near future, Blanchard said. Automotive remains the largest end-market for both nylon 6 and 6/6 resins.
