The hottest methanol industry in China will face a

China's methanol industry will face a reshuffle, and small and medium-sized enterprises will be eliminated

since this year, the market trend of China's methanol industry has been poor. The industry is facing a situation of rapid output growth, stable imports, declining exports, high port inventory, relatively low prices, overcapacity and low industry operating rate. In this situation, the new version of the environmental protection law will be implemented from January 1st, 2015, which will increase the environmental protection cost of the methanol industry. At that time, the methanol manufacturing industry with low industry concentration will usher in a reshuffle, and small and medium-sized enterprises are expected to be eliminated

first, the price of methanol has continued to decline, and the industry has not seen a reversal situation.

since this year, the trend of China's methanol market has been poor, and the price has continued to decline. At present, there is still no reversal momentum. Taking the methanol market in East China as an example, the decline has continued since the beginning of the year, and the current price has declined by 21.79% - 30.52% compared with the beginning of the year. According to the relevant price monitoring data, at the beginning of November 2014, the methanol market in Jiangsu was mostly around yuan/ton. As of November 20, 2014, the price of methanol in Jiangsu was quoted at yuan/ton, the lowest level since 2011. For several months, the domestic methanol market has basically maintained a low-level operating trend. At present, although there is a shock situation in some parts of the industry, on the whole, the industry is not completely reversed

second, the methanol operation problem is complex, and the industry concentration is low

(I) the methanol industry is facing the situation of overcapacity and insufficient operating rate

China's methanol industry is currently facing the situation of high output growth, stable imports, low exports, high port inventory, relatively low prices, and downstream demand has not been fully developed, making the methanol industry in a situation of unabated supply pressure, overcapacity, and low operating rate. Since 2014, the domestic methanol production capacity has continued to increase. In January, the domestic methanol production was nearly 1000 tons, with a total production capacity of more than 65 million tons. The domestic methanol operating rate has remained above or near 55% this year, and the output has maintained a rapid growth In September 2014, the domestic output was 3.45 million tons, with a year-on-year increase of 34%. The cumulative output in September was 28.07 million tons, with a cumulative year-on-year increase of 30.9%

(II) the success of methanol industry has injected great power into material researchers, and the low concentration is not conducive to improving industry efficiency

the industrial concentration of China's methanol industry is not high. In recent years, China's methanol production enterprises have maintained the situation of joint development of large, medium and small-scale. Although some large-scale enterprises have been formed, there are still many small and medium-sized methanol production enterprises in China, and the layout is relatively scattered, which is not conducive to the centralized storage, transportation and processing of commercial methanol, nor to the supervision of environmental protection and safety. As of the beginning of November, 2014, although China's a has fallen back in the past 19 years, there are still 40 higher alcohol production enterprises with a scale of more than 500000 tons/year, accounting for about 20% of the total number of enterprises in the country, involving an annual production capacity of 34.51 million tons, accounting for about 55% of the total national production capacity. At present, there are about 12 enterprises with methanol production capacity of more than 1million tons in China

(III) the new potential production capacity of methanol industry is still large, and the layout is developing towards resource areas

China's methanol production capacity and output still have the trend of developing towards resource areas. From January to November 2014, about 4.8 million tons of new and expanded units have been put into operation in the northwest region, and there are still many new projects in the region in the later stage; In addition to this place, there are also some projects in North China, Shandong, East China and other places. Incomplete statistics show that the methanol projects planned in the later stage are sevenoreight million tons. In addition, China's high-temperature and anti-aging materials are considered to be the most promising technology. Small and medium-sized methanol production enterprises are mainly distributed in Shanxi, Henan, Hebei and other places

(IV) some enterprises are backward in technology and weak in industry competitiveness

the contradictions and problems accumulated in the domestic long-term extensive development model are relatively prominent. Some enterprises follow the foreign coal as raw materials, or follow the traditional technology with low resource utilization efficiency, and continue to expand production capacity based on quantity. The quality of industrial development is poor, and the overall competitiveness of the industry is weak. While foreign natural gas resource countries are export-oriented and develop large-scale natural gas methanol with cheap natural gas and oilfield associated gas as raw materials, which has a significant cost competitive advantage. The impact of foreign low-cost methanol on the Chinese market will exist for a long time

(V) there are differences in the operation of enterprises, and the survival of natural gas to methanol enterprises is worrying.

the raw materials for methanol mainly come from coal, natural gas and coke oven gas. Due to the factors of domestic and foreign economic downturn, the price of coal continues to decline. In addition, coke oven gas to methanol is a by-product of coking enterprises. Therefore, due to the low production cost, the production profit of coal to methanol and coke oven gas to methanol enterprises is acceptable under the condition of overcapacity. Insiders predict that they can make a profit of more than 300 yuan per ton. However, natural gas to methanol enterprises are not. Due to more coal and less gas in China, the supply of natural gas is always tight and the price remains high. Moreover, since July this year, the price of natural gas in Southwest China, an important source of natural gas supply, has been raised, causing the operation of natural gas methanol enterprises to be worrying. Many natural gas to methanol enterprises are struggling, and the profit space of enterprises is very small

III. in the short term, the industry is not good, and the long-term prospects are promising

(I) in the short term: the industry will still maintain the status quo of overcapacity

in the short term, there is no good news in the methanol manufacturing industry, and the industry still maintains the operating status quo of overcapacity, high inventory and declining profitability

(II) short term: high environmental protection requirements will push up the cost of methanol industry

methanol manufacturing belongs to the chemical industry, which is a high pollution industry. At present, the haze area in China has expanded, and the governance and prevention and control of energy conservation and emission reduction have further increased. The catalogue of encouraged industries in Western China released at the end of August also directly excludes the primary coal chemical industry; At the APEC meeting held in early November, coking enterprises in some regions of Hebei and other places were limited to production of 30% or more, and there were polluting enterprises or production stoppages in key control areas. In addition, on January 1st, 2015, the newly revised environmental protection law will be officially implemented. In the new environmental protection law, the illegal cost of environmental pollution enterprises will be increased. Due to the increase of environmental protection costs, the profitability of the methanol industry will be reduced

(III) long term: the prospect of coal to methanol is relatively clear

because China's resource reserves are mainly coal, and the pollution sources formed in China at present are mainly formed by the direct combustion and utilization of coal. In the future, China's resource utilization will convert coal resources into clean energy nearby and then use it. This trend is manifested in two industrial directions: one is to build pithead power plants and develop UHV transmission; The other direction is coal chemical industry, in which coal to methanol is an important field, and methanol has the role of gradually replacing petrochemical raw materials. At present, the downstream utilization facilities of methanol in China are also under construction, such as methanol to olefins. Methanol to olefin enterprises have developed rapidly this year. As of October 2014, the annual production capacity of methanol to olefin in China has reached 4.68 million tons. In 2014, the production capacity increased by 2million tons/year. With the continuous expansion of downstream industries, the prospect of coal to methanol industry is relatively broad

(IV) long term: there will be merger and reorganization flow in the industry

combined with the above two factors, on the one hand, methanol has a promising prospect; on the other hand, due to the improvement of environmental protection requirements, there are a large number of small and medium-sized methanol enterprises in the industry, which will lose in the market competition environment with increased environmental protection requirements and eventually withdraw from the market. Therefore, in the process of industry development, the methanol industry with low industry concentration will appear the phenomenon of reshuffle, merger and reorganization, which will promote the adjustment and upgrading of the industry, and make the industry gradually embark on an efficient way of scale effect. Gradually expand to newspapers, periodicals, digital publishing products, packaging and decoration prints, etc.

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