Rhodia completes de-bottlenecking to add silica capacity

Lyons, France - Rhodia Silcea has recently added around 30 ktonnes/year capacity for highly-dispersible silica materials at its factories arond the world through a series of debottlenecking moves. During 2006, said Peter Browning, global business director for silica at Rhodia, the supply of highly dispersible silica to the tyre industry has been extremely tight. He added that the new capacity is already sold out.

Browning added that Rhodia would like to build a new plant for this material, but is seeking long-term commitments from customers in order to manage the risk associated with the significant investment of capital. He said prices have not been at reinvestment levels historically, so there has been little investment in new capacity.

He added that demand for this product is growing rapidly. Growth has historically been running at 20 percent annually, with the company expecting growth to remain at double-digit levels over the next few years. He added that Rhodia is not prepared to invest in capacity without some commitment from customers to ensure that any such investment generates worthwhile returns for Rhodia over a sustainable period.