Insulation industry news from Global Insulation

Uzbekistan: Russia’s TechnoNicol is ‘seriously considering’ building a new 1.3Mm³/yr stone wool insulation plant In Uzbekistan. Vasily Tkachev, the head of the Mineral Insulation division of TechnoNicol, said that building a plant in the country would be ‘geographically justified,’ according to the Trend News Agency. He added that ‘significant’ changes in the local regulatory framework were expected regarding the requirements for energy efficiency of buildings during new construction and reconstruction. A final decision on the project will be made following a full assessment of the market and its potential sales regions.

Germany: Armacell has recorded earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) in the first half of 2019 of Euro63.4m, up by 29.2% year-on-year from Euro50.6m in the six months to 30 June 2018.

Armacell recorded half-year sales of Euro322m, up by 6.3% from Euro303m. CEO Patrick Mathieu notied the strong performance of both advanced insulation and engineered foams. The first half of 2019 was notable for an increase in Armacell’s Chinese polyethylene terephthalate (PET) production capacity and a commercial cooperation agreement in April with Thermaflex in Russia.

Russia: TechnoNicol plans to spend around Euro5m on an upgrade to its Chelyabinsk mineral wool plant. The majority of the investment will go towards refurbishing the unit’s production line, according to the AK&M Information Agency. The rest will be spent on installing additional cleaning and treatment systems. Once the upgrade is completed the plant will start producing rolled technical insulation materials based on rock wool. The unit will have a production capacity of 0.27Mm³/yr

UK: Russia’s TechnoNicol is to spend Euro42m towards upgrading its mineral wool plant in Stirling operated by Superglass. The investment will double the plant’s production capacity to 60,000t/yr. The upgrade work will include installing a new 187t furnace and curing ovens. Cooling, cutting and milling equipment will be replaced and an automatic packing system will be installed. Construction will start early in 2018.

“TechnoNicol’s backing is a real vote of confidence in Scottish manufacturing, both in terms of the quality of the work we do here and the expertise of the workforce. It is a validation of our strategy within Superglass over recent years and very personally satisfying for me to see further consolidation of the initial investment at our regional headquarters,” said Ken Munro, chief executive officer (CEO) of TechnoNicol UK, Ireland and USA which incorporates the Superglass business.

TechnoNicol operates 52 manufacturing facilities across Russia and Europe.

New Zealand: TechnoNicol’s Techno mineral wool plant in Ryazan has sent a test batch of products to New Zealand. Following feedback the insulation producer plans to arrange a regular export of materials to the region.

Russia: TechnoNicol has completed the construction of a Euro5.4m briquetting unit at its mineral wool plant in Rostov. The new unit will produce briquettes of waste fibres and smelt from the main production line. These will then be used to produce mineral wool. In addition to improving the plant’s environmental credentials the use of briquettes is also expected to reduce costs.

Russia: EuroChem, a fertilizer producer, and China’s ChemChina have signed a memorandum at the 2017 St Petersburg International Economic Forum on the creation of a joint venture to produce chemical industrial products including isocyanates, a precursor of spray polyurethane foam insulation. The cost of the project is estimated to be US$500m, according to the Tass News Agency. The joint venture will also produce propylene oxides for the use in the development of synthetic lubricants.

The companies plan to start the collaboration by forming a working group to further evaluate the technical possibilities of the project and will carry out a financial and legal examination of the project. Once complete the first project will be an upgrade to EuroChem’s Novomoskovskiy Azot plant in the Tula region. Products from the plant will be targeted at the Russian market.

Russia: TechnoNicol plans to invest US$2.3m towards upgrading its mineral wool insulation plant in Chelyabinsk. Just under US$0.9m was invested in the plant in 2016, according to the Kommersant newspaper. The unit supplies products in the Ural Federal District as well as to the Perm region, the Orenburg region, Bashkortostan and Udmurtia.

Russia: Rockwool has completed an upgrade of its stone wool insulation plant at Troitsk, in Chelyabinsk region. The unit will use Power+ technology with enhanced micro-distribution of the binder and optimised fibre-spinning technology on the production line. These improvements are intended to improve the final product’s homogeneity and performance properties.

Denmark: Bjørn Høi Jensen, the chairman of Rockwool, has announced that he will not be standing for re-election at the company’s annual general meeting in April 2017. He said that as he had met his goals to review the management group, start a new growth plan and introduce an ‘extensive’ improvement in results that he was standing down earlier than planned. He originally became chairman in 2014.

Rockwool’s external net sales for its insulation division dropped by 2% to Euro1.63bn in 2016 from Euro1.66bn in 2015. In local currencies the company calculated a slight rise of 0.7% for its net sales. However, its overall profit nearly doubled to Euro166m from Euro90m and its earnings before interest, taxation, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) rose by 21% to Euro389m from Euro322m. It blamed the poor sales on the industrial and technical insulation industries and the slow development of construction in Russia in both new build and renovation. In a statement Jensen described 2016 as a year ‘marked by tough conditions.’

The insulation and building materials producer also announced that it was planning to build three new production plants including a stone wool factory in Mississippi, US. Land acquisitions for the projects are expected to be completed in 2017.