Special Fluids Made in the U.S.A. for Total
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A few miles from Houston, Texas, more than 200 people work at the Bayport petrochemicals plant.
After two years of construction work and an investment of $100 million, a new production unit is nearing completion here, not far from Total's polyethylene plant.
Over 15 miles of pipeline, several reactors and a distillation column to manufacture some very special fluids — high-purity fluids made from traditionally refined hydrocarbon cuts.
Joël Navaron, Vice President Special Fluids, Total
We are producing very pure products. They don’t have aromatics. Our products are biodegradable, colorless, odorless, and they bring very high value to the final product.
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The special fluids manufactured here are used in more than 50 different applications — including some pretty unexpected ones.
For example, our fluids are found in drilling fluids, crop protection solutions, printing ink, sealants and adhesives, and even cosmetics and animal vaccines.
These special fluids may have a host of different applications, but they all have one thing in common — the very high degree of technical expertise required to produce such exceptionally pure products.
The fluids are processed in very high-pressure hydrogen reactors and distilled into narrow fractions.
Brad Klussman, Bayport Plant Manager, Total
In the reaction section, we are basically inserting hydrogen into the aromatics, into the double bonds, to produce the special fluids. And by doing that, we make the product to be a lot more pure, a lot more non-reactive and stable.
Charline Fowler, Process Engineer, Bayport, Total
That poses technical challenges, and also safety challenges. We used hydrogen here in the plastic plant, but not in such quantity and not such a high pressure. For a process engineer, starting up a new plant is extremely exciting. That’s the best challenge you can have in a career.
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But the plant isn't the first of its kind for Total. It's actually the second, after the Oudalle special fluids plant in France.
Joël Navaron, Vice President Special Fluids, Total
Our customers are worldwide. Therefore with only one plant that we have in Oudalle in France, it was very difficult for us to respond to our clients everywhere in the world. Therefore, we decided to increase our production capacity and we started with that plant in America.
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To provide customers with the purest fluids in the market, Total's production will increase to 700,000 tons a year, of which nearly 250,000 from the Bayport facility.
Total's Port Arthur refinery, located less than 80 miles away, will supply most of the feedstock processed at Bayport.
The commercial teams in the United States worked closely with the technical teams to develop the roughly 40 custom products the new plant will manufacture.
This local production should prove to be a key advantage in the U.S. market.
Peter Egan, Special Fluids Commercial Manager in the U.S., Total
A USA client would want to have a domestically available product. They’re not really happy to be working on an import model. That being said, we’ve now got production locally and the plant’s going to give us that opportunity.
Mickey Callanan, Chief Operating Officer, PfP Industries
So having the Total plant local is going to make this oil much more readily available and keep the cost down and keep it competitive.
Peter Egan, Special Fluids Commercial Manager in the US, Total
Clearly, we’re going to be in a really strong position to be able to serve the rest of the Latin American market. Whichever country we want to get to, we can get there very easily. We are strategically placed. But we’re new here. We’re growing here and we've got a lot to do here.
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The new facility is bringing Total closer to customers in North and South America, producing fluids recognized for their wide array of applications and very high purity.