India halts MEG anti-dumping investigation.
Petrotahlil - India's ministry of commerce and industry has halted its anti-dumping investigation into ethylene glycol (MEG) after receiving a withdrawal request from the applicants.
Indian private-sector refiner and petrochemical producer Reliance Industries (RIL), the key applicant, had requested on 18 November to withdraw the probe for unspecified reasons. But it still has the option to resubmit an application to relaunch the investigation.
The Indian government had started an anti-dumping investigation into imports of MEG under HS code 29053100 from Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Oman, UAE and Singapore in December 2019. RIL then in late February made a request to the authorities to exclude Saudi Arabia from the investigation.
MEG is a major feedstock for the polyester industry and is used to produce PET fibers, PET film and resins. India is the world's second-largest polyester producer after China with around 10mn t/yr of capacity.
RIL is India's largest MEG producer, operating seven production lines with total nameplate capacity of 1.4mn t/yr. It started up a new 700,000 t/yr MEG unit in 2018, reducing India's imports by about 45pc to 657,000t in 2018 from 1.2mn t a year earlier. But imports rebounded to 768,000t in 2019.
Operating rates in downstream Indian polyester sector have recovered to normal levels since late August with current high operating rates boosting consumption of MEG. But domestic supplies are insufficient to fulfil demand.
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