Profits Before Environment.

[soundman]

High-sulphur petrol a windfall for IRPC

Banned in Thailand, fuel sold to China

BUSRIN TREERAPONGPICHIT DARANA CHUDASRI

IRPC Plc, the country's leading petrochemical manufacturer, expects sales of about five billion baht over the next three years, or up to 1.7 billion baht a year, due to its solid marketing push in southern China, according to Suphon Tubtimcharoon, chief planning and administration officer. IRPC and Xishuangbanna Gas & Petroleum Industrial Co, a Chinese privatised petroleum company, recently signed a three-year contract for IRPC to supply 100 million litres of high-sulphur and octane 91 petrol to serve rapidly rising demand in southern China. Many countries ban high-sulphur petrol because of its polluting side-effects.

IRPC, formerly known as Thai Petrochemical Industry (TPI) and now controlled by PTT Plc, earlier sold 12 million litres per year of high-sulphur petrol to Yunnan through general oil importers.

The contract is a strategic move, as the company's 10-year-old oil refinery produces about 100 million to 120 million litres per year of high-sulphur petrol as a result of its aging facilities. The company is prohibited from selling high-sulphur fuel in Thailand.

The products need to undergo a costly cracking process to transform them into low-sulphur products that can be sold in Thailand.

Protect your own citizens - just poison your neighbours.

A little short sighted wouldn't you say?

Soundman.

[ThaiGoon]

What's more mindbogling is why the Chinese are buying. What the....

[kmart]

What's more mindbogling is why the Chinese are buying. What the....

At the moment, they cannot import enough fuel to power their massive economic growth. They cannot get gas and coal out of the ground fast enough either...

Friends working over there tell me that the environment around industrial centres is horrendous.

[soundman]

What's more mindbogling is why the Chinese are buying. What the....

At the moment, they cannot import enough fuel to power their massive economic growth. They cannot get gas and coal out of the ground fast enough either...

Friends working over there tell me that the environment around industrial centres is horrendous.

And you have to remember that for three to four months a year the weather patterns take all that industrial pollution right over northern & central Thailand...

Soundman.

[Jamie]

I don't know how they are going to sustain their current rate of growth. It is true though, they can't get their hands on enough fuel as is. They will take what ever they can get. I see that just recently they found a huge gas field. Maybe they will begin to fuel their vehicles on NG.

I read that China is building one new coal fired power plant per week. Right now they have a net energy deficit of around 35,000 MW.

[plachon]

What the article doesn't mention is that the petrol is being transported to China via the Mekong River. It only takes one boat accident and all that high sulphur fuel could end up in the drink, causing a pollution incident that could wipe out many species of aquatic life for hundreds or even thousands of kms downstream. anybody who has eaten Mekong fish or walked along the banks of the river from Chiang Rai down to the delta in Vietnam and observed the villagers fishing, would realise what a potential disaster for millions of people this could be.

So it's not only the SE Asian air which is at threat, but the food and income of countless poor people in Laos, Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam. Sobering thought when one sees the level of navigational safety on the Mekong..........................

[GuestHouse]

Let's put this in perspective.

The Low Sulfur fuel is indeed banned in Thailand but its not like IRPC have not been selling the stuff, it is simply that they have now re-routed it to China. Prior to that it was being sold to other markets, including being shipped off shore and then smuggled back into Thailand.

Take a drive along the road heading north/south from the southern provinces and you'll see plenty of lorries hauling drums of smuggled fuel.

The failing here is the Chinese who are willing to take any fuel, and the west for not pushing China to apply low sulfur technology, which China CAN afford and which we in the west have available off the shelf.

Incidentally.

Compared to the shit that is burned by the world's shipping fleets this stuff being sold to China is sweet and clean.

The concerns expressed about protecting the Mekong are indeed correct, but once again this is an example where ASEAN and its policy of not interfering in the internal affairs of member states is standing by and watching a disaster unfold. The pollution is happening now, not oil but industrial waste and sewage, exacerbated by reduced river flows due to China's super dams.

A disaster in the making

But what can be done?.. I'll start with... Don't eat fish from the Mekong

[GuestHouse]

Oh and its not jus the Thais that do this.

A little searching around and you'll find thousands of products sold around the world that are banned in their home country.

And then there is the huge trade coming out of China, fake and often seriously enviromentally damaging produces, ranging from internationaly banned pesticides through pharmaceuticals to asbestos bearing brake components.

[soundman]

Q: Why would you ban a product like sulphourous petrol in your country?

A: To protect the citizens & environment within.

Then why sell it to a neighbour where the problems you are protecting your country against flote right back into your yard?

A little like a burglar coming to rob your gun shop & you selling him the bullets to put in his un-loaded gun.

Cheers,

Soundman.

[GuestHouse]

Q: Why would you ban a product like sulphourous petrol in your country?

A: To protect the citizens & environment within.

Then why sell it to a neighbour where the problems you are protecting your country against flote right back into your yard?

A little like a burglar coming to rob your gun shop & you selling him the bullets to put in his un-loaded gun.

Cheers,

Soundman.

You are confusing what goverments do, and why goverments do what they do, with what business does.

The reason why businesses do these things is alway profit.

I'll guarantee that your home country does not ban companies from selling products overseas that they are not allowed to sell back home.

[soundman]

Q: Why would you ban a product like sulphourous petrol in your country?

A: To protect the citizens & environment within.

Then why sell it to a neighbour where the problems you are protecting your country against flote right back into your yard?

A little like a burglar coming to rob your gun shop & you selling him the bullets to put in his un-loaded gun.

Cheers,

Soundman.

You are confusing what goverments do, and why goverments do what they do, with what business does.

The reason why businesses do these things is alway profit.

I'll guarantee that your home country does not ban companies from selling products overseas that they are not allowed to sell back home.

And there lies my point with this particular instance. The govt. banned the dangerous petrol to protect the environment & citizens (probably just bowing to international pressure ) & yet it still condones / allows the manufacture & sale for profit by one of thailand's larger companies to a neighbouring company where all the negatives about the product still come back to affect Thailand.

A tad short sighted - or just getting around international opinion?

Cheers,

Soundman.

[LinkPopularity]

soundman ... how do you travel bike or big car ?

[Mid]

Let's put this in perspective.

high sulphur fuel is going to be released into the GLOBAL atmosphere ,

you know , the one from which you and I and every living thing on this planet breaths ...................................

[Edonista]

High-sulphur petrol a windfall for IRPC

Banned in Thailand, fuel sold to China

BUSRIN TREERAPONGPICHIT DARANA CHUDASRI

IRPC Plc, the country's leading petrochemical manufacturer, expects sales of about five billion baht over the next three years, or up to 1.7 billion baht a year, due to its solid marketing push in southern China, according to Suphon Tubtimcharoon, chief planning and administration officer. IRPC and Xishuangbanna Gas & Petroleum Industrial Co, a Chinese privatised petroleum company, recently signed a three-year contract for IRPC to supply 100 million litres of high-sulphur and octane 91 petrol to serve rapidly rising demand in southern China. Many countries ban high-sulphur petrol because of its polluting side-effects.

IRPC, formerly known as Thai Petrochemical Industry (TPI) and now controlled by PTT Plc, earlier sold 12 million litres per year of high-sulphur petrol to Yunnan through general oil importers.

The contract is a strategic move, as the company's 10-year-old oil refinery produces about 100 million to 120 million litres per year of high-sulphur petrol as a result of its aging facilities. The company is prohibited from selling high-sulphur fuel in Thailand.

The products need to undergo a costly cracking process to transform them into low-sulphur products that can be sold in Thailand.

Protect your own citizens - just poison your neighbours.

A little short sighted wouldn't you say?

Soundman.

I say I rush to buy IRPC shares

[GuestHouse]

So where is it written that any company is bound by laws that do not exist?

The problem is not the company but the failing of the international community - and very much the failing of ASEAN - to come up with internationally accepted environmental laws.

With respect to low sulphur fuels, the west and the US in particular have been promoting the adoption of low sulphur standards.

In this thread we have a growling emoticon at the suggestion (false) that low sulphur fuel laws where forced on Thailand. The fact is that China has huge reserves of cash available to ensure that China can purchase clean fuel technology - from the west hence the west's keaness to promote its use.

China does not choose to spend their reserves in that way.

[lannarebirth]

Let's put this in perspective.

The Low Sulfur fuel is indeed banned in Thailand but its not like IRPC have not been selling the stuff, it is simply that they have now re-routed it to China. Prior to that it was being sold to other markets, including being shipped off shore and then smuggled back into Thailand.

Take a drive along the road heading north/south from the southern provinces and you'll see plenty of lorries hauling drums of smuggled fuel.

The failing here is the Chinese who are willing to take any fuel, and the west for not pushing China to apply low sulfur technology, which China CAN afford and which we in the west have available off the shelf.

Incidentally.

Compared to the shit that is burned by the world's shipping fleets this stuff being sold to China is sweet and clean.

The concerns expressed about protecting the Mekong are indeed correct, but once again this is an example where ASEAN and its policy of not interfering in the internal affairs of member states is standing by and watching a disaster unfold. The pollution is happening now, not oil but industrial waste and sewage, exacerbated by reduced river flows due to China's super dams.

A disaster in the making

But what can be done?.. I'll start with... Don't eat fish from the Mekong

While it's true that Bunker C fuel is indeed the worst there is. IMO conventions have created regulations for stack scrubbers that diminish greatly the mount of pollutants to the atmosphere. As for the sulfurous fuel Thailand is selling China, even a little bit of knowledge about regional weather patterns will tell you it will end up back in Thailand as acid rain.

[GuestHouse]

Scrubbers asside, the issue is not regional weather, nor profit over the enviroment, the problem is the failure to agree even modest international legislation.

Thailand, China are in ASEAN an impotent talking shop which could, but will not, discuss these issues, not because they want to protect proffits, but because they want to protect their half witted idea of non interference in each other's internal affairs.

Masterly managed by China so as to run roughshod over the interests of its neighbours.

[soundman]

Scrubbers asside, the issue is not regional weather, nor profit over the enviroment, the problem is the failure to agree even modest international legislation.

Thailand, China are in ASEAN an impotent talking shop which could, but will not, discuss these issues, not because they want to protect proffits, but because they want to protect their half witted idea of non interference in each other's internal affairs.

Masterly managed by China so as to run roughshod over the interests of its neighbours.

I think this is a good point. I would also expand it to say that most ASEAN members don't really give a sh!t what each other is up to.

Another example I thought of last night is Australia & its mining of a large percentage of the world's uranium supplies. - even though Aussie doesn't really use the stuff. Don't get me wrong, nuclear power is one of the ways of the future, however, I believe it also inherently dangerous, from a number of different point of views - like selling it to Iran for example.

Cheers,

Soundman.