C-MACC Perspectives No 23A
Would You Rather Build In Ohio or Alberta?
We follow our perspectives piece on Monday that discussed initiatives to boost petrochemical investment/production in Alberta, Canada with our views of the push in the US Marcellus region/Ohio following the announced exit of Daelim as a JV partner with PTTGCA to construct an ethylene and derivatives complex.
The Ohio project is partly baked, from a permitting, design and feedstock agreement perspective, whereas all but Dow and Nova would be starting from scratch in Alberta. The Ohio project is also close to polymer consumers in the US.
- The negative might be a possible downside scenario on ethane availability and price – the Alberta surplus looks larger and has no alternate market. 10-15 years from now US natural gas demand my not support the levels of production in the Marcellus and Utica to maintain ample ethane, especially if the US Gulf is short ethane at that time – the Marcellus would still have a relative price advantage.
See PDF below for all charts and tables