A fire explosion was reported at Sanman Petrochemical at Yeosu, South Korea in the starting of this week. Firefighters managed to contain the fire after a few hours. There were no reported casualties. Authorities speculate that the fire was caused by a fuel leak, as Samnam Petrochemical is known to have been testing boilers that were recently replaced. PTA prices are expected to spike in the near term. Samnam Petrochemical has an annual PTA output capacity of 1.5mn tons (1.8% of global output). The damaged plant should be off line for around a month, so PTA prices should not remain inflated for long.Domestic PTA producers include Hanwha General Chemical (2mn-ton capacity), Samnam Petrochemical (1.5mn-ton), Taekwang Industry (1mn-ton), Lotte Chemical (0.6mn-ton), SK Chemical (0.52mn-ton) and Hyosung Chemical (0.42mn-ton).
