If you think the economy aint bad down here:

[deepsouth]

TweetThis is a plant next door to us- or was


Plant cuts 220 employees
By Nathaniel Lukefahr
The Facts

Published February 13, 2009
LIVERPOOL — Equistar Chemicals, a LyondellBasell subsidiary, cut 220 employees Thursday from its parent company’s Chocolate Bayou complex after leaders approved a long-term closure of the site’s olefins plant.

Between 30 and 40 employees will remain on-site to perform maintenance and security measures, dropping LyondellBasell’s Brazoria County presence to about 80 workers, spokesman David Roznowski said. The company’s 40-person polymers facility near the olefins unit will continue to operate.

“As you can imagine, it’s all a result of the economy and a lack of demand for ethylene,” Roznowski said.

In November, the site employed about 400 people, including both full-time employees and contractors.

Plant management and senior company leaders broke the news to employees Thursday morning, Roznowski said. Employees were offered severance packages, but Roznowski declined to release what they included, citing company policy.

“Our work force took it like the true professionals they are,” Roznowski said.

LyondellBasell shuttered the plant indefinitely Jan. 2, about three weeks after idling it, with plans to bring it online after product demand increased. But the economy continued to stall, and the Houston-based company filed Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection five days later.

On Wednesday, LyondellBasell announced the temporary shuttering of polyethylene plants in France and the United Kingdom, also citing low product demand.

“Although demand for polyethylene has significantly improved compared to the fourth quarter of last year, normal patterns have not been achieved yet,” said Richard Roudeix, LyondellBasell’s vice president for polyethylene in Europe, in a prepared statement. “This measure is another step in our efforts to continue our business in a way that is economically reasonable.”

The company had kept Chocolate Bayou workers employed throughout the process, “but with the long-term idling, it didn’t make any sense monetarily to keep people employed,” Roznowski said.

“Current projections for ethylene demand indicate that we can meet the needs of our customers without this plant in operation,” said Vaughn Deasy, vice president of LyondellBasell base chemicals, in an e-mailed statement. “We are assessing various alternatives for the olefins plant to preserve the greatest value for the company. While it is difficult to release this skilled work force, we cannot maintain staffing at previous levels while the plant remains indefinitely idled.”

Equistar Chemicals notified the bankruptcy court Thursday about the decision, Roznowski said.

“Anything we do right now is subject to bankruptcy court, so we filed a motion,” he said. “But, I can’t really get into that one.”

LyondellBasell, through its global subsidiaries, has 11 olefins plants worldwide with an annual capacity of 14.9 billion pounds of ethylene and 8.7 billion pounds of propylene. Locations include Channelview, La Porte, Chocolate Bayou and Corpus Christi; Clinton, Iowa; Morris, Ill.; Wesseling and Muenchsmunster, Germany; and Berre, France.

The Chocolate Bayou olefins unit had a capacity of 1.2 billion pounds per year of ethylene and 725 million pounds of propylene.

Company officials don’t know when the site could come back online.

“Due to the market and our ability to supply all of our customers from our other sites, it’s hard to say ‘what if,’” Roznowski said.

[deepsouth]

TweetDow just cut 300 employees yesterday from a site down by me and said there was more to come:

Dow lowers dividends for first time
By Nathaniel Lukefahr
The Facts

Published February 13, 2009
FREEPORT — Dow Chemical Co. cut its dividend by 64 percent from last quarter’s Thursday, a move unprecedented in company history that was made to conserve cash in a sluggish economy.

The petrochemical giant declared a 15-cent dividend, down from 42 cents after the third quarter, spokesman Bob Plishka said. In Dow’s 112-year history, this will be the first dividend decrease.

The dividend is payable April 30 to shareholders of record on March 31.

Many factors contributed to the Dow board of directors’ decision to slash money paid to shareholders, Plishka said.

“Factors included the current macroeconomic environment, certainly,” Plishka said. “The impact on demand for petrochemicals, which is down, and problems in the credit market. All these things are contributing factors.”

On Feb. 3, Dow reported a $1.5 billion fourth quarter loss despite setting an annual sales record of $57.51 billion in 2008. It reported a $1.68 loss per share for the final quarter.

Dow suffered two losses when Petrochemical Industries Co., a subsidiary of Kuwait Petroleum Corp., backed out of a $17.4 billion merger in December. Chairman and CEO Andrew N. Liveris had planned to use $7.5 billion in cash from that deal to purchase specialty chemicals producer Rohm & Haas.

Dow then missed its deadline on the Rohm & Haas buyout, prompting that company to file suit in Delaware courts against the Midland, Mich.-based petrochemical company. In February, Rohm & Haas officials posted letters online requesting the Dow board of directors override Liveris’ actions and approve the deal. In the latest one, posted online Feb. 8, Rohm & Haas officials say Dow has avoided attempts to release information necessary for further buyout discussions, and “Dow’s actions continue to be severely damaging to our company.”

Despite the weakened economy, Dow still offered a dividend while other companies have decided against it, Plishka said.

“We’re still paying our shareholders,” he said. “That’s the important point to make. There are a lot companies who’ve canceled or eliminated their dividend altogether, such as Motorola. We’re still going to be paying a dividend. We’re still going to be returning 6 percent.”

This will be the 390th consecutive cash dividend issued by Dow.

When Dow released its third quarter dividends in December, Liveris assured stockholders the company would not halt dividends as the market soured.

“Dow has no intent of stopping its long-standing tradition of declaring dividends to its shareholders,” he said in a statement released Dec. 11.

[pigmeat]

Tweetits getting bad everywhere