Among the varieties of synthetic resins, polyethylene (PE) has larger output. HDPE has the largest output and consumption in the varieties of polyethylene resin.
1、Constant Increase in Global HDPE Production and Consumption
(1) Supply
In recent years, driven by the capacity growth of the Middle East and Asian regions, the global capacity of HDPE resin has grown rapidly. Asia is the biggest production area of HDPE in the world, followed by North America, the Middle East and Western Europe. The United States is still the largest HDPE production country in the world, followed by China.
With the advantages of raw material cost in the Middle East,the exploitation of shale gas in large scale in the United States and Chinese coal chemical industry development, it is expected that the global HDPE capacity will keep stable growth in the next five years.
(2) Demand
In 2013, the development of the global economy was positive and consumption of HDPE grows at a higher speed. In the downstream of HDPE,, packaging articles consume the greatest HDPE, followed by the automobile industry, products for building, consumer goods and industrial supplies. Asia was still the largest HDPE consumption region in the world.
In the next five years, as the global economy continues to be improved, especially the rise of developing countries and emerging economies, the application fields of HDPE will be constantly expanded and its demand will grow steadily. The areas with the quickest increase in demand mainly include Asia-Pacific region, Central and Eastern Europe, the Middle East and South America. In the future, China and Western Europe will still have the biggest net import of HDPE.
2、Large Market Gap Exist in China
In recent years, as a new round of refining-chemical integrationand ethylene projects have been completed and put into operation, HDPE capacity in China has been further increased.
Among the PE varieties in China, HDPE is the largest one in production and consumption. In the next five years, the new capacity of HDPE in China will mainly come from coal chemical projects, refining-chemical integration projects and ethylene reconstruction projects. In the future, great changes will take place in China’s HDPE raw material structure and the capacity of HDPE with coal as raw material will constantly be increased.
The low cost of polyethylene products made by the natural gas of the Middle East and shale gas of the US will enter the Chinese market on a large scale, which will impact more seriously on the PE products from oil as a raw material. Besides, the technology of coal-to-ethylene gradually becomes mature and can be applied on a large scale, making the traditional “oil- ethylene- polyethylene” industrial chain face greater pressure and Chinese PE manufacturers face the threat of gradually-compressed profit space. Therefore, enterprises should vigorously develop and produce specialized materials brands of HDPE, develop high value-added and high-tech products to improve profitability of the enterprises and seek further development.
HDPE production in China is mainly concentrated in Sinopec and PetroChina. The main production enterprises of HDPE resin in China in 2013 are shown in Table 1.
Due to large gap of supply and demand of HDPE in China, most the newly-built ethylene projects take HDPE as the supporting scheme of main downstream. The production status of HDPE resin in China from 2002 to 2013 and the forecast for the next five years are as shown in Figure 1.
3、Rapid Growth of HDPE Consumption in China
In recent years, with the rapid development in the fields of packaging, automobiles and building materials in China, the consumption of China’s HDPE has grown rapidly. From 2008 to 2013, the average annual growth rate of HDPE consumption in China reached around 13%. In 2013, China’ Customs carried out the “green hedge” activity, and promoted the increase in the use of new material of HDPE. The consumption of HDPE resin increased significantly, reaching more than 9 million tons with a 12% year-on-year growth.
China’s consumption of HDPE resin is more balanced in the downstream fields and the specific consumption structure is as follows: blow molding products, films and sheets, injection molding products and pipes respectively account for 20%; the total of fiber and others account for about 20%.
（1）Blow Molding Products
Because HDPE has high density, rigidity and toughness and good processing performance, it is applicable to the production of liquid food containers, household chemical containers, medicine and cosmetic bottles, industrial containers, car tanks, engine oil bottles and other kinds of big, small and medium-sized hollow containers. Liquid food container has been the biggest consumption field of HDPE.
（2）Film and Sheet Products
In the film products, HDPE is mainly used for the production of packaging film and greenhouse film. The consump- tion of packaging film accounts for 97%.
Because the production of film has no such high requirement for equipment and process, there are many such production enterprises in China. In addition, the film material HDPE is developing in the direction of geomembrane.
The greenhouse film that China producing is mainly functional greenhouse film and ordinary greenhouse film. At present, the consumption of functional greenhouse film in China accounts for about 30% of the total amount. As for the production of ordinary greenhouse film, in most cases, special resin of HDPE greenhouse film and general LLDPE are mixed with different ratios.
（3）Injection Molding Products
The main applications of HDPE injection molding materials products are industrial packing container, shipping packing container, goods container, pallet, intermediate bulk container, fruit case and fish basket, as well as motorcycle accessories, bottle caps, food containers (such as the packaging of frozen food and ice cream), toys and household goods (tableware plate, plate frame, ice tray, laundry basket, kitchen utensils).
（4）Pipe
HDPE pipes can be divided into water supply pipe, drain pipe, gas pipe, mining pipe, spray irrigation pipe for farm- land and communication pipe (such as conduit pipe, silicon core pipe, the plum-shaped pipe). In China, HDPE pipe materials are mainly used in water supply pipe, gas pipe, mining pipe and communication pipe.
Gas pipe has relatively high performance requirements for HDPE special resin.At present, HDPE pipe special materials are produced without unified marks and a complete set of specifications, so it is more backward than the production capacity of HDPE pipe materials. China’s HDPE special resin for gas pipe mainly relies on import.
In addition, HDPE is also used in fiber products, wires and cables, coating products and foam products. HDPE fiber products mainly include monofilament and woven products, which are used in the manufacture of wire rope, fishing nets and color striped cloth.
4、Self-sufficiency of HDPE Will be Constantly Improved
From 2008 to 2013, with the construction of a batch of large-scale refining-chemical integration projects and ethylene projects in China, China’s HDPE production capacity and output grew rapidly and the growth rate of consumption was also remarkable.Therefore, HDPE imports are rising and the market gap is constantly widening. In the next few years, many of the coal chemical projects that China is building will be concentrated to put into production, and HDPE capacity will grow rapidly. Meanwhile, with the improvement of people’s living requirement and the advancement of infrastructure construction and national urbanization, the fields of HDPE blow molding hollow products, packaging film, injection molding and pipe products will be rapidly developed and they will promo- te the growth in HDPE demand. Overall, it is expected that the gap of HDPE in China will decline, but still in a higher level, and the self-sufficiency will grow constantly.