Global chemical/petrochemical industry to witness a critical make over with increase in Shale gas E&P activities

With the increase in Shale gas E&P activities across the globe, leading with North America, Europe, Argentina and now China the global chemical/petrochemical industry downstream is expected to witness a critical make over due to the supply shortages in various chemical feedstock, as per Future Market Insights. Ethylene, propylene, butadiene and benzene are the four building blocks of various chemicals or petrochemicals produced downstream for consumption by end use industries.
Shale Gas is an unconventional, un-associated gas which contains 75-90% Methane, 15-5% Ethane and the rest C3’s and heavier hydrocarbons. With lower percentage of heavier hydrocarbons the supply of propylene, butadiene and benzene are expected to decline with respect to Ethylene supply. Excess of Shale production has resulted into an increasing preference for ethane cracking compared to Naphtha cracking, which would result in a supply shortage for C3’s and above. The result would be lower availability of propylene and other basic chemicals. In order to ensure optimum supply, on purpose technologies are being built in North America and Asia Pacific