Huntsman Corp. said it will raise prices on polyetheramines used in additives, Dow Biocides announced upcoming price increases on a variety of chemicals used in metalworking fluids, and Oxea said it would raise list and off-list prices for several solvents. Dow Biocides of Buffalo Grove, Ill., announced announced global price increases of 10 percent, effective May 19 or as contracts allow, on both list and off-list prices on several products, including the following types used in metalworking fl...

Galp Energia Group and ExxonMobil Mediterranea s.r.l. have signed an agreement for the sale of shares of Esso Espanola, S.L. and ExxonMobil Portugal Holdings BV, owner of Esso Portuguesa LDA, to Galp Energia. The sale includes transfer of most of ExxonMobils lubricants businesses in the two countries to Galp. The price of the transaction, announced Friday, was not disclosed. The companies said the transaction represents a petroleum product sales volume of about one million metric tons per year...

Miller Industrial Fluids acquired industrial lubricantblender Crescent Oil Co. Inc.on April 11. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed. Indianapolis-based Miller Industrial Fluids is a manufacturer and distributor of industrial lubricants, metalworking fluids, rust preventatives and cleaners. Former Crescent Oil President John Burns III said Crescent had eight employees at the time of the acquisition. The company was originally founded in 1893, according to Burns, and had moved to its India...

REACH, the European Unions chemical regulation scheme, is more about trade and business than the environment, experts told the ILMA Management Forum earlier this month. Failure to comply – the narrow window for preregistering chemical substances opens June 1 and closes Nov. 30, 2008 – could result in a ban on a companys exports to the EU. According to a March PricewaterhouseCoopers survey, North American companies are woefully unprepared to assess their exposure to REACH, the EUs Re...

MOSCOW – Taneco, a unit of Tatneft, disclosed plans last week to construct a new API Group II/Group III base oil plant in Russias Tatarstan region within three years, with capacity to make 100,000 metric tons of base stocks per year. In addition, officials from three existing base oil refineries, two in Russia and a third in Turkmenistan, told an industry conference here that their facilities have plans to upgrade to Group II and/or Group III production. Those projects still await final ap...

Marathon Petroleum Co. yesterday began notifying customers of its plans to exit the base oil, wax and aromatic extracts markets, and to eventually shut down its base oil plant in Catlettsburg, Ky., several sources told Lube Report. The base oil plant has 6,800 barrels per day of API Group I capacity. Linda Casey, communications manager for Marathon Petroleum, on April 23 confirmed the companys plans. Finished products specifications and commodity markets have changed significantly over the past...