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Chemingineering | Caring Hands

K. Sahasranaman (Independent Industry Consultant)
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Chemingineering | Caring Hands

As the world continues to battle the deadly coronavirus, the chemical industry has risen to the occasion and is helping to keep the warriors at the frontline safe by supplying hand sanitizers, disinfectants, and PPEs. The alacrity and agility with which the industry is responding to the COVID pandemic is something to be very proud of.

Hands of Care
As the COVID19 pandemic rages relentlessly through our world, new rules are getting written to govern our daily lives. Among them is the practice of frequent hand-washing, which was widely regarded as an Obsessive Compulsive Disorder.

We are being brainwashed into frequent and extended hand-washing by celebrities, virologists, and politicians through creative memes on social media. Hand hygiene has emerged as an important weapon in our battle against the very contagious coronavirus. If we were to tell tales of these extraordinary times to generations not born yet,
hand-washing rituals will dominateour narratives.

Hand-washing
Though people have been washing their hands for more than a thousand years as part of religious rituals, washing specifically for reasons of hygiene is only about 130 years old. It all began in 1846, at the maternity ward of a hospital in Vienna. Doctors and medical students used to shuttle between performing autopsies and delivering babies without washing Hungarian doctor, identified this as the cause of the high mortality rate in the maternity ward. He imposed the practice of hand-washing with chlorine bleach, after which the mortality rate fell dramatically. But Semmelweis was hounded for this improvement and he died a broken man in a psychiatric institution at the young age of 47.

Hand sanitizer
Though the disinfecting properties of alcohol have been known for hundreds of years, hand sanitizers as we know today dates back to the 1960s. There is an apocryphal story that was invented by a nursing student in California. The earliest documented reference of the development of an alcohol-based hand rub credits it to Peter Kalmar, a surgical assistant at the University Medical Centre in Hamburg. The first bottles of hand sanitizer were marketed under the brand name of Sterillium in June 1965. WHO’s sustained global campaign on hand hygiene led to the widespread adoption and popularity of the hand sanitizer.

Exploding Demand
And now the rampaging coronavirus has brought the hand sanitizer to center-stage and made it ubiquitous. It has been estimated that the demand for hand-disinfectants exploded by 1400% from December 2019 to February 2020. They have vanished from every shelf in every store across the world. The demand for hand sanitizers continues to grow, even outstripping the rate at which the virus infects people. Before the advent of the coronavirus, the global production of hand sanitizers was 3 billion liters per year. Now, WHO estimates that we need 3 billion liters per month to fight the pandemic. As the world prepares for a long and exhausting battle against the contagious coronavirus, the hand sanitizer will be at the forefront, preventing the infection from spreading among the corona-warriors – nurses, doctors, and other healthcare workers. Hand sanitizer has become essential for life.

Chemical Industry
As the demand for hand sanitizers surged week to week, the chemical industry quickly got into the act. Many chemical companies repurposed their existing production facilities to manufacture hand sanitizers. Some even announced setting up new facilities to manufacture the precious commodity. BASF diverted several tonnes of Isopropanol to manufacture hand sanitizers at its Ludwigschafen site. Much of its production is being supplied free of charge to hospitals in Germany. Ineos, a leading European manufacturer of Ethanol and Isopropanol, built four new facilities in a matter of a few days in the UK, France, and Germany to produce hand sanitizers. The plant at Lavera, France to produce one million bottles per month was assembled and started up in a mere 10 days. The Hungarian company MOL converted a windshield washer production facility to produce 50,000 liters/day of hand sanitizer. The conversion and obtaining the requisite approvals were managed in a record time of 2 weeks.

The list of companies currently producing hand sanitizers reads like a who’s who of the chemical industry.

Supply Chain
The explosive surge in the demand for sanitizers has exposed the chinks in the supply chain for this rather mundane product. The key ingredients for the hand rubs are ethanol and isopropanol, both of which are coming under intense supply crunch. China, the world’s
leading producer of isopropanol, is in the process of opening up after weeks of closing down. France, another leading producer, has banned all exports of isopropanol. Prices of isopropanol have tripled in the last month. With isopropanol all but disappearing from the markets, sanitizer producers are turning to ethanol. Potable alcohol companies have been roped to strengthen the supply chain. In a cruel twist of irony, the Indian government has ordered that reserves of rice be used to brew alcohol. But in the USA, ethanol plants are shutting down, because of the low demand for blending with gasoline. US FDA has been rather reluctant to approve the use of fuelgrade ethanol for use as a disinfecting agent.

Regulatory Approvals
The enthusiasm of numerous chemical companies to manufacture hand sanitizers has been
matched pragmatically by the regulators. In Europe, hand and surface disinfectants are covered under the Biocidal Products Regulation (BPR). However, the BPR has a provision, Article 55, to waive off approvals in the event of a public health emergency. Many countries in Europe have invoked this mechanism to initiate production and marketing of disinfectants that comply with generic formulations of WHO. US EPA also announced that it will temporarily allow manufacturers of disinfectants to source active ingredients from any supplier without obtaining prior permits from the agency.

Essential Industry
Hand sanitizers are not the only product through which the chemical industry is contributing to the war against coronavirus. Specialty plastics and polymers are being churned out in increasing quantities towards face masks, PPE, disinfecting wipes, etc. DuPont has launched a new initiative to increase the supply of protective apparel made out of Tyvek, a spunbonded fabric made from polyethylene fibers. The company has nearly doubled its production capacity of the fabric and plans to deliver 6 million gowns per month to protect the frontline healthcare workers. DuPont provides designs and patterns that are optimized for easy and accelerated manufacturing of gowns from Tyvek. Meanwhile, in the US, the chemical industry received a terrific boost by being declared as “Essential Critical Infrastructure” by the Department of Homeland Security. The DHS said that the chemical industry has a special responsibility to maintain the work schedule while  following guidelines on workforce and customer protection. This is a shot in the arm for the chemical industry, which has endured decades of negative public perception The alacrity and agility with which the chemical industry is responding to the COVID19 pandemic are very heartwarming. Those in the frontline of the war against coronavirus can rest assured that they are in the caring hands of the chemical industry.

Readers’ responses may be sent to:
k.sahasranaman@gmail.com or
chemindigest@gmail.com

Nutraceuticals

Chemical Industry Digest
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How to Revive Indian Economy in the Post COVID-19 Period? – Need for National Brain Storming

Chemical Industry Digest
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How to Revive Indian Economy in the Post COVID-19 Period? – Need for National Brain Storming

 

It is reported all over the world that the recession has set in after the COVID-19 disaster. At this stage, no one is clear how and when COVID-19 would end.

After the G20 summit, it appears that there are no strategic and well-coordinated global action plans to overcome the recessionary trends in the post COVID-19 time, except throwing some vague suggestions that 5 trillion US$ should be pumped into the global economy and China suggesting that duty tariffs should be reduced.

While rich nations would somehow manage the situation and recover in due course of time due to their technological and economic strengths built over several years, highly populous and developing country like India with around 25% of the population below the poverty line, is likely to face an extremely difficult time.

The question uppermost in the mind of every Indian is how our prime minister, Mr. Modi would tackle the scenario in the post-COVID-19 period.

Given the “free for all” situation now prevailing in India, every action that the prime minister would take to retrieve the situation would be criticized by one group or the other. The media is also likely to focus more on negatives rather than on the positives.

In such circumstances, it is extremely important that the prime minister should focus on the tasks ahead and act with the courage of conviction to move on, given the mandate that he has received from the people to govern India till 2024.

Major challenges:
The major challenges would be the lack of investment by the private sector, increasing joblessness due to the slowdown in the economy and the government having to spend most of its resources in welfare measures with little money left for investment in setting up manufacturing units or facilities in the services sector.

Constitute think tanks:
It is extremely important to constitute think tanks for several core areas to discuss and work out strategies that should be submitted to the Modi government by the end of May, for its consideration and appropriate action.

These think tanks shouldn’t be a gathering of bureaucrats and economists, who often lack firsthand information on ground realities. The functioning style of Niti Aayog has also given the impression that it is a jack of all trades and master of none.

Total of 20 think tanks should be constituted with ten members for each think tank, with one think tank for each of the following core sector to finalize the strategies:

  1. Agriculture / plantations
  2. Steel and metallurgy
  3. Chemical and petrochemical/ fertilizers / pesticides
  4. Power / energy
  5. Mining / Minerals
  6. Automobiles
  7. Pharmaceuticals
  8. Textile
  9. Sugar
  10. Paper
  11. Cement
  12. Information technology
  13. Transportation
  14. Food processing
  15. Dyestuffs
  16. Paint & coatings
  17. Electronics & Instrumentation
  18. Research & development
  19. Herbal & traditional medicine
  20. Miscellaneous (other than the above)

While bureaucrats, economists, and planners could be members of the think tank, people with hands-on experience in the management and shop floor practices and workmen representative should also be part of the think tank. The politicians should be kept out of it.

There are many people in India who are not part of the bureaucracy or in leadership positions in industry associations or known to the governments, but who have an enormous level of experience and understanding, who can come out with original suggestions. The think tank should encourage them to send their views and suggestions for consideration of the think tank.

A firm time schedule of eight weeks should be given to the think tank to submit the suggestions and the think tanks should be disbanded after this period.

Since the task of the members of the think tanks should be carried out with patriotic fervor, no remuneration should be provided but only travel and stay expenses should be reimbursed to the members of the think tank.

India needs massive investments:
India needs massive investments in multiple sectors in the next five years to boost economic growth, generate employment and reduce poverty level.

The question is whether the prime minister can depend upon the Indian investors and entrepreneurs to deliver the goods to the extent needed.

If one would carefully analyze the scenario in the last six years, it can be seen that the investment in the private sector has not been adequate and the government has been spending its resources in building infrastructure facilities, building fertilizer plants, etc.

Obviously, there is a mindset problem amongst large sections of Indian entrepreneurs. The efforts in technology up-gradation front are very poor, making the Indian industries and services sector almost entirely dependent on multinational companies for setting up projects in India, even in some of the medium and small-scale sector.

It is not as if Indian companies do not have enough investment capability. Many have surplus investible resources and have the option of availing bank loans and sourcing money from the public by way of equity. But, most of them are unwilling to commit their resources in setting up projects to the extent needed and they look for easy options for investment. Cases have been seen, where large manufacturing units have stopped production and started importing the same product for trading in India, claiming that they make more money by trading rather than manufacturing!

It is strange to see manufacturing companies in chemical and other sectors with more than Rs. 1000 crore annual turnover and good profit, diversifying into real estate sector or construction of five-star hotels, mutual fund business, communication sector, etc.  instead of investing their money in setting up manufacturing outfits.

Can one say that the Indian private sector managements either lack pride or lack confidence about their capability in their core areas of activities?

Of course, the private sector may have several excuses for not venturing into new manufacturing units but what is needed is to strive to overcome the constraints instead of running away.

Follow the Chinese model:
A few decades back, China was in the same position as India is today. Then, the Chinese government took the pragmatic decision to open up their economy and encourage multinational companies and overseas organizations to invest in setting up projects in China with their updated technologies.

Attracted by the huge market potential in China and with the compulsive need to expand operations, many multinational companies from rich regions like the USA, Europe, and Japan rushed to China with investment plans. To the credit of the Chinese government, it should be said that it prepared the proper climate and framed appropriate regulations for the entry and smooth operations of multinational companies in China.

In the process, China gained significantly in acquiring technological strength and in making a big leap forward in industrial and economic growth. Now, China is in a position to dominate the world not only in the supply of goods and services but also on the technology front.

Inability to exploit the slowdown in China:
After the US-China trade war, the Chinese economy slowed down to some extent and many overseas companies in China decided to shift the manufacturing base out of China and unfortunately India was not the destination for most of them.

It is true that in the last few months, the prime minister has considerably liberalized the regulations for overseas investments in India and he has been touring abroad frequently to invite the global entrepreneurs to invest in India. But the results are not coming to the level needed.

Vietnam and Thailand gained the most due to the Chinese slowdown.  So many China-based ventures have moved to Vietnam and it is now reported that there is a labour shortage in the country.

India has to examine as to why this has happened. It is the task of the think tank to carefully study the challenges and undo the mistakes and constraints in getting the investments and technology from abroad.

Need to assess the conditions at the micro-level:
The think tank that will have a membership of cross-section of thinkers should go deep into the subject and evolve plans at the micro-level. A broad-based approach would not be enough.

Is democracy a bottleneck for progress?

In recent times, several running projects have been closed down and new projects have been prevented due to sponsored agitations by the so-called environmentalists and activists.

Several judgments of the judiciary with regard to the acceptability of the projects have been defied by mob protests. Many state governments have obliged the protestors and the project schemes have become the victim of politics.

Strong leadership at the center and state level with adequate credibility amongst common people is the need of the day and they should study the issues in proper perspective and take decisions in the national interest and defy the vested interests that block the projects for whatever reason.

It remains a question as to whether the central and state governments can manage such situations in “free for all democracy” that we have in India.

State governments need quality leadership. Corruption is still prevailing in India mostly at state government levels that are blocking the progress of the Indian economy in several ways. People and investors get frustrated.

In several cases, politicians at various levels have an active role in corruption and nepotism.

One way to overcome the situation is that those involved in the economic and welfare activities should voice their protests vehemently in various forums, instead of reconciling themselves to the disturbing situation or even in some cases trying to snatch some advantages for themselves by pleasing the forces of corruption. The question is whether Indian investors, entrepreneurs and all those who understand the importance of massive investments in India in multiple sectors can raise their voices effectively to protect the economics and industrial interests of the country, which is a pre-condition for growth.

Chemingineering | Silver Bullet

K. Sahasranaman (Independent Industry Consultant)
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Chemingineering | Silver Bullet

For the first time in history, the entire human race is confronted with a single common enemy – the virus causing COVID-19. Even as the virus is spreading disaster on an unprecedented scale, a race is on to build a vaccine that will save us. This month’s column takes a peek into the fascinating world of vaccines.

With COVID-19 spreading fear and death across the globe, many medical professionals are of the opinion that only a vaccine can be the silver bullet against this scourge. Vaccines are biological preparations of antigens, the proteins found on the surface of pathogens. Antigens alert our body to the infection and trigger an immune response. The world of vaccines is fascinating with many principles of chemistry and chemical engineering
at play.

Classical Vaccines
Vaccines come in many types. Classical vaccines use the entire microbe, either weakened or dead. The earliest vaccines used live virus or bacteria that have been deliberately weakened. Famous examples include the smallpox vaccine of Edward Jenner and the rabies vaccine of Louis Pasteur. These attenuated vaccines evoke a strong immune response and confer lifelong immunity after just one or two doses. Attenuated vaccines are easy to produce for certain classes of viruses, but difficult for others. Inactivated vaccines use dead bacteria or virus, as in the case of polio. The microbe is killed by chemicals, heat or radiation. Toxoid vaccines use diluted dosages of the toxins produced by the invading
bugs. Best examples of this category are diphtheria and tetanus vaccines. The discovery of the toxoiding process for the diphtheria vaccine was a stroke of serendipity; the residual formalin after cleaning of containers was found to have weakened the toxin.

Modern Vaccines
Sub-unit vaccines use only part of a target pathogen to provoke a response from the immune system. This may be done by isolating a specific protein from a pathogen and presenting it as an antigen on its own. Including only the essential antigens in a vaccine can minimise side effects. Conjugate vaccines consist of 2 components – the antigen and a carrier protein – linked covalently, and elicit a very powerful immune response. They are central to all infant immunisations. Another kind of subunit vaccine, called recombinant vaccine, is created by genetic engineering. It involves inserting the DNA from the virus into another cell to make them produce the active ingredient, a protein, for the vaccine. This technique was successfully used to produce a vaccine against Hepatitis B.

Manufacturing Process
Viral vaccines are manufactured by growing mammalian or avian host cells in a controlled environment and infecting them with the target virus. The manufacturing process has 3 steps – growth, harvesting and purification. A typical process begins with growing the cell culture by fermentation in a series of bioreactors. The raw materials have to be identical for every batch – a certified vial of the culture from a seed bank. Once the cells have increased 5-10 fold in the seed reactor, they are transferred to the production reactor where they increase by another 5-10 times. There is a series of fermentors, each 5-10 times bigger than the previous one. By the time the cellgrowth phase ends, the cells would have increased thousands of times. The microbes can be fussy about the nutrients and the medium. The process demands precise control and absolute sterility. In the final growth step the cells are infected with the genetically modified virus. The active vaccine intermediate is harvested from the growth media by dead-end or crossflow filtration, or centrifuging. The main process parameters for control and optimisation are pH, dissolved oxygen concentration, cell concentration at infection, quantity of virus inoculated per cell at infection, medium composition, and timing of harvest. The manufacturing facility should be GMP compliant and should have adequate containment level, usually BSL-2.

Purification
Purification is a key step in vaccine production for getting regulatory approvals. Vaccines should be free of all contaminants that can provoke adverse reactions in the recipients. Purification has 3 stages. The first step is to quickly isolate the target molecule from conditions that could lead to its inactivation or loss. The second step is to eliminate the contaminants. The final polishing step removes trace impurities. Various solid-liquid separation techniques, like filtration, centrifuging, chromatography are widely used in the purification process. Chromatography is a very powerful technique for the polishing step because the impurities have similar characteristics as the target molecule. New  chromatographic resins with multimodal binding ligands have simplified the purification steps. Membrane chromatography is also an attractive option. The chromatographic processing of vaccines continues to evolve with a focus on reducing the number of steps and improving the yield.

Formulation
Formulation and filling of vaccines pose many technological challenges. Formulation is usually dilution of a high potency bulk product to the appropriate strength. As vaccines  volved they got safer, but at the cost of efficacy. This loss of efficacy is compensated by adding adjuvants. Adjuvants make the vaccines work better by evoking stronger immune response from the recipients. Aluminium salts, such as aluminium hydroxide, aluminium phosphate, and aluminium potassium sulphate have been used safely as adjuvants for more than 70 years. Antigens are adsorbed on the aluminium adjuvants and it is important to ensure homogeneity during the formulation and filling process. Stabilisers are added to maintain the vaccine’s effectiveness during storage, particularly where the cold chain is unreliable. The quality expectations of a vaccine are stringent because it will be administered to millions of perfectly healthy people. Even leachates from glass vials and their rubber stoppers are a matter of concern.

Nucleic Acid Vaccines
Recently, a radically new approach to vaccination has been developed. It involves the direct
introduction of the DNA or RNA sequence encoding the antigen against which an immune response is sought. By in situ production of the target antigen, our bodies become vaccine factories. Nucleic Acid vaccines are non-viral vaccines and have a number of potential advantages – stimulation of improved immune responses, improved vaccine stability, the
absence of any infectious agent and the relative ease of large-scale manufacture. The production process avoids the use of problematic starting materials such as animal- derived components, and results in high batch-to-batch reproducibility.

Production Platforms
Furthermore, the same production process can be used for many different vaccines. This platform characteristic of the production process eliminates several expensive steps required to fulfil regulatory demands. The process can be easily adapted to GMP conditions and the time between clinical trials and commercial production can be significantly shortened. The total production process is highly flexible and scalable; it can be easily changed to the production of a new vaccine within a few days. Also, the process can be scaled to the production of millions of vaccine doses either in one big facility or in several smaller ones. While many clinical trials of these new age vaccines are underway, none of them have been licensed so far.

Epilogue
Even as this is being written (19th March), the first Phase-I clinical trial for mRNA vaccine, a type of nucleic acid vaccine, against COVID-19 is underway in USA. The biotech company, Moderna, was already researching the coronavirus behind the Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) and was thus able to adapt their methodology and vaccine design towards SARS-CoV-2, the virus responsible for COVID-19.

Two other German biotech companies – CureVac and BioNTech – are also in the race to develop a mRNA vaccine against COVID-19. Hopefully one of them would be the silver bullet that humanity is in desperate need now..

Readers’ responses may be sent to:
k.sahasranaman@gmail.com or
chemindigest@gmail.com

Power of Solar in the Industry

Chemical Industry Digest
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Power of Solar in the Industry

Renewable and inexhaustible, solar energy is harnessed using mirrors and panels to produce electricity by transforming the continuous flow of energy from the sun.
The industry is on the cusp of revolution for cleaner, inexpensive and a sustainable energy future for the world.
To understand the potential and implications of the utilisation of solar energy in the chemical industry, Chemical Industry Digest obtained the views of Manu Karan, Vice President of CleanMax, India’s leading renewable energy developer and sustainability partner of choice for leading corporates in India.

Chemical Industry Digest (CID): Is solar energy technology based
on PV (solar panels) or does it also include concentrated solar energy? Are these panels / equipment indigenously produced or are they imported?
Manu Karan (MK): Of all the green solutions that are being explored, solar power seems
to be the most feasible as sun rays reach most parts of the country and India enjoys
more than 333 sunny days being in a tropical region. Solar energy has two main basic
sources of power: concentrated solar thermal systems(CSP) and Photovoltaic (PV) solar
power solutions.

At CleanMax, we specialise in PV solar power solutions, which uses photovoltaic technology that generates electricity from sunlight in a direct electricity production process.

Until a few years back, the market in India was uncertain and very small, hence a lot of equipment and technology was imported. Today most of the technology is sourced from Indian manufacturers. Each installation is different based on the space, industry
type and usage. Hence, we customise our solar power solutions for each client.

CID: Is the solar energy provided as an alternative supplementary source or can it provide all the needs of a chemical plant? Up to what kW of electricity can it generate?
MK: At CleanMax, our mission has always been to help commercial and industrial sector
(C&Is) to achieve their sustainability targets while also saving cost. We offer chemical
companies a way to reduce their power costs by 20-40% (depending on the state) without
any upfront investment.

PV Solar power can be generated only during the day and it works as a supplementary source to grid power which leads to better efficiency and sustainability over time.
A 1 MW plant can generate around 1.5 million units of electricity in the first year. Through rooftop solar, a chemical plant can source upto 10-15% of its energy requirements.
Through open access (either 3rd party sale or group captive), a chemical plant can source
upto 90% of its energy requirements from Solar.

CID: To what extent can a chemical plant be independent of grid power by also utilizing solar power? Can continuous supply be ensured even during days when there is no sunlight?
MK: While solar along with batteries is a possible technology for 24/7/365 days of power, it is not a commercially viable solution to source all of a Chemical plant’s energy from such a combination of technology.

Solar as a commercially viable technology can only be a grid synchronised supplementary source of energy. Hence, by definition, the chemical plant sourcing solar power through this method will not be grid independent. However, even though there is grid dependency,
there is tremendous savings in cost of energy through grid synchronised onsite and offsite solar power.

To service this need, CleanMax has expanded its large-scale offerings to almost all major states – if a manufacturer has factories in different states in India, chances are we can provide grid-connected renewable energy in most of those. The only states where we
don’t provide open access power are those which don’t permit it at all.

We are successfully providing around 10.5 million units of solar electricity annually to leading chemical companies across different locations in India through our open access solar farms and rooftop solar projects, which means abating around 10,080 tonnes CO2 per
annum, equivalent to planting 1,51,205 trees or taking off 1,941 vehicles off the road.

CID: What about the space required to put up the panels and against what space how much kW can be generated?
MK: 1 MWp (1000 kWp) solar system would require 10,000 sq. m / 1,00,000 sq. ft / 3 acres of shadow free area. The electricity generated is also largely dependent
on the capacity requirement and the number of solar panels installed.

CID: Lithium storage as we understand is for small units. Since there are safety issues that are associated with Lithium, how safe are these batteries for use in chemical plants?
MK: Contrary to popular belief, lithium is safer than lead acid batteries as lead batteries emit more harmful gases which are not only harmful to the environment but also to the workers working in the factories. Thus lithium batteries are very safe for usage in chemical
plants.

CID: Could you throw some light on RE100?
MK: Globally, over the past one or two decades, sustainability and climate change have moved from the margins of corporate decision making to the mainstream. As of today, many of the world’s largest companies have signed onto RE100, which commits them
to achieving 100% renewable energy sourcing within a defined time frame. The list of signatories includes leading manufacturers from all major industries, and includes Unilever, General Motors, Akzo Nobel, Philips, Nestle, Dalmia Cements and Tata Motors, to
name just a few and dozens of others have signed similar pledges.

Ten years ago, any sustainability initiative, however small, was typically seen as a positive measure. Today, there is a strong push for companies to switch over completely to renewable energy, for 100% of their power requirement. Hence those who have not signed
the RE100 pledge are also feeling the urgency of addressing the sustainability of their operations; based on pressure from shareholders, investors, customers and employees.

India’s renewable power capacity has soared by almost 150 per cent in the last five years to 86 GW. The government has set a target of 175 GW renewable energy capacities by 2022 which includes 100 GW from solar.

Chemical Industry Digest – March 2020

Chemical Industry Digest
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Chemical Industry Digest – March 2020

Articles covered in this issue:

Interview- Power of Solar in the Industry
– Manu Karan, Vice President, CleanMax
The industry is paving its way to adopt energy efficient technologies and planning to incrementally phase out the use of fossil fuels.
Read the views of the Vice President of CleanMax, a leading partner of choice of many chemical companies to know more about utilizing solar power in the operations of chemical plants.

Infocus
Renewable Natural Gas Technology (RenGas): Sustainable Solution
– Deepak Patil, Sharad Laldas, Aamod Natu, Jitendra Akade, Dr. Shaileshkumar Sawale, Dr. Aarohi Kulkarni – Praj Industries Ltd.
As we are moving towards sustainable technology, Praj’s RenGas technology serves as an appropriate solution for renewable gas. This article describes the entire process of developing RenGas from sugar-industry

Energy Efficient, Cleaner & More Productive Jaggery Plant
– Pankaj Arya, Satish Kumar, G.D. Thakre, Amar K Jain, Anjan Ray- CSIR-IIP
Optimizing energy utilization in processes and systems in manufacturing plants is an important objective which provides many benefits. One example of scaling up energy-efficiency of a jaggery plant-so very useful for rural economies based on developments made by scientists from CSIR-IIP is detailed here.

Keep Cool When Designing Batch Reactors – John Edwards
The stirred batch reactor is the most widely used reactor in the laboratory and industry. The author explains the importance of designing temperature-control system for such reactors so as to drive chemical reactions and achieve optimum output.

Don’t Get Mixed Up By Scale Up – Dr. David D. Dickey
Production scale-up requires several in-depth engineering studies of the process in order to overcome challenges to yield efficient outcomes. The author describes how using dimensional analysis and applying geometric similarity in mixing assures a reliable scale-up from the laboratory or pilot plant model to a full-scale commercial plant.

Solutions to Industrial Problems – Raghava Chari
The author has provided various solutions related to real life industry problems he found in his 45 years of operational experience in process plants. In this feature, problems related to bearings and mechanical seals, cooling tower fans, CO2 stripper, urea reactor top custom blind leaks, and DPTs are covered.

Chemingineering – Vaccine, the Silver Bullet against Covid-19
– K Sahasranaman, Independent Consultant
COVID-19 is creating disruptions on an unprecedented scale globally. Scientists are working round the clock to develop a vaccine that can save the human race from this pandemic.
Our columnist gives a gist of the evolution and current developments in vaccine technology.

Digital Solutions to Take Chemical Industry to the Next Level

Chemical Industry Digest
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Digital Solutions to Take Chemical Industry to the Next Level

The global chemical industry is witnessing rapid increase in demand and leveraging digitalization to improve its operational efficiency has now become a vital need for the industry. To achieve efficiency in the supply chain, companies need comprehensive and tightly integrated solutions that can combine demand management, planning and scheduling. This can easily integrate into manufacturing execution systems and enterprise resource planning systems. This kind of integration is critical for manufacturers to manage their assets effectively and truly optimize their production processes, especially when the processes are leaning more towards being sustainable.

To understand the implications of digitization of the chemical industry in India, Chemical Industry Digest spoke to AspenTech, a leading name in digital solutions across various industries around the globe.

Chemical Industry Digest (CID): Industry 4.0 is expected to create a revolution in the chemical industry with tremendous benefits, opportunities as well as challenges. What motivations drive deployment of Industry 4.0 in the chemical industry?
Antonio Pietri (AP): There are multiple drivers of deployment in the chemical industry that are in place at the moment. Industry 4.0 is now seen by chemical companies as a must to remain competitive. These companies are also facing significant societal challenges like climate change, from mounting plastic wastes, the push towards a circular economy and recycling.

Industry 4.0 is a set of technologies that will help these companies accelerate the transition to newer business models in order to adapt their business to these challenges. Overcoming these challenges requires companies to rethink their businesses. These technologies help them accelerate and improve their competitiveness and sustainability as businesses.

Sanjeev Mullick (SM): The dichotomy facing Asia is that more and more people are moving to the middle class and that means there is a greater need for energy and greater demand for plastics that comes with the improvement of standard of living. But people are also starting to challenge the impact of plastic wastes on the environment; so the chemical industry has to find a way to reconcile this. Industry 4.0 plays an important role in the reconciliation of their respective business models with the Environment, Sustainability and Governance (ESG) requirements.

CID: Now with the advent of Industry 4.0, every upcoming plant across the globe will be digitally equipped. But how can existing plants be retrofitted digitally?
AP: There might be some old plants in India, which are 40-60 years old and also some new chemical plants e.g. Reliance’s Jamnagar complex. In the process industry, plants are being built and continuously upgraded to new technologies. They have upgraded from analogue, pneumatic controls to digital control and the use of technology keeps advancing their operations. Over the last 10-15 years, an acceleration in the uptake of technology to drive the performance of these assets is seen to continually drive a greater return on the capital investment in India. AspenTech has been playing a role of helping these companies to adopt more of its technologies to improve their operations in increasing the efficiencies of older plants.

CID: What about the skills required for applying Industry 4.0 and the need for skilled personnel or reskilling existing manpower?
AP: There is a new generation of capabilities – AI, Deep Learning, cognitive capabilities in processing now, which allow us to automate the knowledge that is required to use our products. We are focused on upskilling through training, on making our products easier to use, and also on having a strong focus on how to automate knowledge. Here in India, just like in other countries, we note a generational shift happening in the process industry including in the chemical industry. There is a new generation of industry professionals coming in with a background in years of exposure to computers, who expect a different user experience from newer generation software.

SM: A variety of classroom training programs are offered at AspenTech’s Pune office. Along with that e-learning is offered, which is available from the comfort of the trainee’s desk. Recently a certification program has also been introduced that benefitted many of AspenTech’s Indian customers. We also increase the intuitiveness and the ease of use of our products by conducting usability studies during the product development phase.

John Hague (JH): Research and development is also important. Many AI based products are being developed in such a way that the operators and the engineers in the plants can actually operate them based on their normal work flows. They don’t have to be data scientists to be able to use our machine learning tools. The user interface is integrated in the work flow itself and the system makes smart decisions internally.

CID: What are AspenTech’s growth plans in India?
AP: We are very optimistic about our business in India. We see the opportunity to scale up our operations and take advantage of the local talent for implementation of our technology. India also offers great support for the sustaining the value that is created from our technologies. We are focusing on hiring locally as our business grows. India can be a platform for supporting our operations in the Middle East as well. We see an opportunity to establish India as a base from where we can then extend our support from here for the other parts of the world.

CID: Would AspenTech consider setting up software development centre in India, given the capable and untapped research talent in India?
AP: We currently have a set-up on a global basis where we do all of our R&D in the US, both in our headquarters in Bedford, Massachusetts and in Houston and then a lot of the quality testing is done in China. We don’t have any plans at the moment for India because we like to keep our operations very lean. However, if there is an opportunity in future, India would be our natural choice, considering the talent available here.

CID: Considering AspenTech’s software installation growth in large scale plants, how can small scale and medium scale industries that constitute the bulk of Indian manufacturing benefit from AspenTech’s software?
AP: Perhaps a number of years ago you could think of India with companies mainly small scale or medium scale but with the Jamnagar complex of Reliance Industries, one of the biggest complexes in the world and other such big plants, the situation has changed. Small and medium companies are gaining skills very fast. In our experience, the tier 2 and tier 3 companies tend to focus more on technology as a driver for operational excellence. We are starting to see this transition in India, where the small and medium scale industries are driving to compete with bigger companies, especially on a global basis by adopting new generation software, upgrading their facilities to achieve operational excellence.

CID: In which areas- whether in engineering, manufacturing and/or supply chain optimization can Indian companies benefit from AspenTech’s softwares?
AP: Indian companies can benefit from across a range of our technologies. While conceptualizing a new plant, the basic designing of the plant starts with our engineering suite and then the detailed designs are undertaken by other companies. And as the plant is built then the optimization of operations is done with our technology. As more plants are put in place, the supply chain people can also use AspenTech’s supply chain solutions and eventually our asset performance management, which is about predicting equipment failure, process accreditation using machine learning capabilities, can be used.

Abhinav Chowdhary (AC): To give one example, industries often grapple with downtime related issues. It affects their productivity and throughput directly. Downtime is the area where our customers are putting a lot of attention on, with respect to needing more digitization. Indian customers have to leapfrog in terms of the maturity of the digital data in terms of real time availability. Indian companies are trying to incorporate the needed digital framework for this. Once that is done, leveraging this to make sure that all the predictive and prescriptive analytics help both safety and the uptime of the processes is important. This is something that customers in the chemical industry or in refineries and adjacent industries, are open to.

SM: It also justifies investments in some of the sensors because some of these assets were very basic, and didn’t have proper instrumentation and sensors. Now we have an application that delivers significant value and that justifies the sensorization of some of those assets. There are a couple of cases where this project using our machine learning prescriptive analytics is justifying these instrumentations.

CID: The newly launched product Aspen Enterprise Insights seems very promising due to its unique feature of information aggregation. How do you see it being applied in the Indian Chemical Industry?
AP: Aspen Enterprise Insights is a product acquired from a startup Sabisu in the UK, which focused on enterprise solicitation and workflow management. In the last 5 years, with the expansion of data and assets around the world, customers need aggregation of information from their plants in the country or from around the world. Aspen Enterprise Insights satisfies this requirement with its ability to aggregate information and also develop applications that can be used to create collaboration in the organization. In India, there are many customers who are interested in this application. Since the product is released in the market just a couple of months ago, we are hopeful that more Indian companies adopt this technology and leverage from it.

CID: Are there AspenTech offerings that help in proactive safety management of chemical plant operations? Can these latest digital technologies make chemical plants totally safe?
SM: As has been described, we have a variety of tools that help to design, operate and maintain chemical plants for our customers. During design our tools can make sure that the designs are inherently safer. Plant personnel can carry out “What-If Analysis” to make sure these designs are safer. Before plant start up, they can also use our tools to carry out operator training. When it comes to operations, there are tools to keep the plant operating at optimum safety. This is often achieved through computational control. When it comes to maintenance, by using predictive and prescriptive analysis, our softwares generate alerts for customers that a certain signature pattern is developing which might lead to shutting down of their system.

JH: Our software, such as our asset performance management suite helps managing unplanned downtimes that often occur at industrial facilities. Since unexpected shutdowns can be avoided using technologies such as ours, we are able to help reduce safety related incidences to upto 12 times than normal. Operations can be controlled as the operator is aware in advance when an equipment is going to have a problem, and thus discontinuation of the process is avoided by taking proactive measures to keep the equipment running – by executing maintenance in advance.

CID: With the world now seriously concerned our climate change and the environmental issues could you elaborate on how AspenTech’s products and services address issues of sustainability. What is your role in renewables-based production?
AP: We are involved across a range of sustainable solutions, for example, our software is being successfully used in the designing of carbon capturing systems in Australia.

SM: In all those areas we described before- Design, Operation and Maintenance- we offer a full range of solutions to industries, including companies producing biofuels for example. We have customers that are using our tools in the research of hydrogen fuel cells and batteries, especially in Japan and Korea, which are the leading examples of countries that are investing in these technologies.

CID: Speaking of sustainability, an alternative to the fuel-based automobiles is the paradigm shift of innovation towards E-mobility. So with the expected rise in the usage of electric cars, does the company see a decline in oil and gas/ refinery projects?
AP: There is no doubt that over time there will be a bigger shift into other forms of energy, renewables including EVs, and there is a likelihood that oil and gas companies will face a plateau in growth due to declining demands over the next 20-30 years. But in a way that is also an opportunity for us. As these companies face a constrained demand environment, values to the shareholders can be created by improving the company’s operations by using cutting edge technologies, such as ours.

CID: AspenTech has acquired companies like Mtell, would your future growth plans include more of such acquisitions?
AP: Certainly, AspenTech throughout its history has been a very aquisitive company and the way we think about mergers and acquisitions is a ‘buy versus make’ model. We can develop technology internally and spend efforts on hardening the technology in the marketplace or alternatively, find companies that have already been through the journey, the desired technology is ready and we can acquire it. So our focus is certainly to run the company in a way that generates efficient cash flow so then we have the flexibility to make acquisitions and accelerate innovation in the company.

Chemingineering | China’s Sneeze

K. Sahasranaman (Independent Industry Consultant)
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Chemingineering | China’s Sneeze

The mysterious Coronavirus has created an unprecedented situation in China shutting down businesses and locking up people in their homes. It has disrupted the global supply chain of raw materials and intermediates. Our columnist examines the impact on chemical industry and what it can do protect itself against such Black Swan events in the future.

Don’t put all your eggs in one basket, advised our ancestors. Now that China is sneezing, the rest of the world has caught the cold. The supply chain logistics of many chemical manufacturers across the world lie in shambles in the wake of the Coronavirus outbreak in China. Travel restrictions and the resultant widespread absenteeism coupled with reduced demand as a result of economic slowdown is affecting the productivity and efficiency of the Chinese chemical industry.

China’s Capacity
Over the past several years, China has built up humungous capacities in many chemicals. It accounts for more than half of the global production of many chemicals including methanol, MTBE, PVC and PTA. China’s share of the global production of PTA is a whopping 65%. It produces 58% of the world’s methanol and 52% of the global PVC. Other major commodity chemicals in which China enjoys the lion share of world capacity are MTBE (54%), soda ash (50%), VCM (46%), caustic soda (45%), toluene (42%), MEG (42%), mixed xylenes (40%) and paraxylene (40%). In the basic building blocks too, China has a dominant share: ethylene (18%), propylene (32%) and benzene (32%). It produces 36% of the world’s polypropylene and 18% of polyethylene. China’s share of the world polyester capacity is a monstrous 65%.

Supply Disruptions
With such massive capacities built-up in one corner of the world, the outbreak of Coronavirus has caused unprecedented disruptions in the supply chain. Many downstream industries in China are under forced lockdown to contain the infection. Others are operating at sub-optimal capacities due to staffing shortages. Local demand has taken a serious hit as the economic activity slows down. Some upstream producers did not shut down during the long Lunar new year holidays and inventories had already piled up as a result of reduced offtake during the holidays. With the virus outbreak now delaying resumption of normal production in the downstream sector, major producers are feeling the heat of rising inventories. Exports are also seriously affected as restrictions on travel has impacted stevedoring and customs at ports.

Delayed Restart
Many enterprises who scheduled their annual maintenance to coincide with the New Year holidays are now taking time to resume production. MIBK production has been severely curtailed with some plants extending their holiday-shutdown. 500,000 tonnes/year of epoxy resin capacity is currently unavailable due to delay in restart. Other chemicals affected due to similar delay in resumption include styrene, isopropyl alcohol, and ethylene oxide. Many provincial authorities issued directives asking businesses not to resume normal operations until 10th February. This was later extended to 1st March in some provinces. There is much uncertainty on when normal operations will be restored.

Demand Crunch
Authorities have imposed severe travel restrictions to contain the spread of coronavirus. During the New Year holidays, travel dropped by as much as 80%. Wuhan, the 5th largest city in China and the epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak, was placed under lockdown on 23rd January. This was later extended to other cities covering 60 million people, the largest quarantine in history. People returning home after holidays were asked to go into self-imposed quarantine or risk punishment. Beijing and Shanghai have morphed into ghost cities with near-empty streets. The consequent lower demand for fuels means that refineries are operating at lower loads. State-owned Sinopec has imposed cuts on refinery operations ranging from 10% to 35%. The lower refinery operating loads has resulted in a supply crunch of feedstock for the petrochemical industry, which is already reeling from lower demand from downstream users. It is thus a double whammy for the petrochemical producers.

Supply Chain
Comparisons are being made with the SARS outbreak in 2003. But at that time, China’s economy was only the 6th largest with 4.2% share of the global GDP. Today, China is the 2nd largest economy in the world accounting for 16.3% of the world GDP. China has become a manufacturing behemoth in addition to its massive market size. China is now much more integrated with the global economy, contributing 12.4% to the global trade. The economic and social ramifications of the coronavirus outbreak are thus different from that of the SARS outbreak by at least one order of magnitude. Today’s supply chains are also exceedingly intricate and complex to what they were in 2003. Also the current scenario is unique in that both supply and demand have been affected. Dun and Bradstreet estimates that 22 million businesses, or 90% of all active businesses in China, are located in the regions most impacted by the virus. They further estimate that if the virus is not countered by June, the global GDP would contract by 1%.

Indian Industry
Companies overly dependent on cheap imports from China have been badly hurt. The pharmaceutical industry is the most severely hit as it sources nearly two-third of the APIs from China. Raw material stocks are in grave danger of getting depleted within weeks. Agrochemicals and dyestuff are other sectors that will be significantly affected due to disruption of raw materials and intermediates. However, some companies see this crisis as an opportunity to increase their production and make up for the deficit from China. The loud message for the Indian Chemical industry is to unshackle itself from the overdependence on Chinese imports and look for alternate suppliers.

Lessons
Every crisis offers lessons for the future and coronavirus outbreak is no different. It has already provided an unexpected fillip to the “Work from Home” movement. Technologies and infrastructure for remote working are expected to bloom and mature in the coming days. But the biggest business transformation will be witnessed in the future-proofing of supply chains. The current scramble for locating alternate suppliers will consolidate into building redundancy in sourcing through geographical diversification. Big enterprises will increasingly rely on disruptive technologies like Artificial Intelligence and Blockchain to smartly switch supply chains on demand. Businesses also need to reconsider the prudence of having lean supply chains and reduced inventories. It is time for a profound rethink on supply chain management and rewriting of its rulebooks.

Epilogue
As of writing (20th February), the virus has infected 74,576 people and caused 2,118 fatalities. In the absence of transparent data over the spread of the disease, rumours are rife that the authoritarian regime maybe concealing the real intensity and extent of the crisis. Hubei province, in a fresh directive today (20th February), asked companies not to resume work before 11th March.

Readers’ responses may be sent to:
k.sahasranaman@gmail.com or
chemindigest@gmail.com

Union Finance Budget 2020-21 Industry Specific Snapshots

Chemical Industry Digest
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Union Finance Budget 2020-21 Industry Specific Snapshots

The second budget tabled in the parliament by Smt Nirmala Sitharaman focuses on issues that propels the growth of aspirational India. The budget presents roadmap to strengthen chemicals, oil & gas industry, pharmaceutical, fertilizer industries as well as overall industry & individuals in general, as peresented here.

Introduction
On weekend of 1st February 2020, where majority of the Indians were probably welcoming the 2nd month of the Year 2020, our Finance Minister Smt. Nirmala Sitharaman took up the responsibility to present the Union Budget 2020-21, which was one of the longest budget speeches of the budget history.

With less than three months before the budget to inject confidence into India’s economy, the Finance Minister slashed the corporate tax rates. However, due to slow growth in global economy, this was washed out. All the eyes were on new announcements to revive the Indian economy.

There was very less space left for Finance Minister to cover all the expectations of public and industry in this Union Budget 2020-21. A fabulous attempt was made to specify India’s mission for Year 2020-21by focusing on three prominent themes:
1. Aspirational India – Better standards of living, with access to health, education and better jobs;
2. Economic Development – Ensuring higher productivity and greater efficiency;
3. Caring India – Human and compassionate society.
Salient proposals in the Budget affecting chemical, oil and gas, pharma, fertilizers, science and technology and healthcare industry alongwith few major Budget announcements are discussed under.

Industry Specific Proposals
Chemical industry
While there are no specific policy provisions for the Chemical industry, the Government has proposed to abolish the anti-dumping duty on import of purified terephthalic acid (PTA) from certain countries, which is a critical input for textile fibres and yarns.

Further, to boost the chemical industry in India, the Government has proposed certain reductions on custom duty on raw materials and inputs imported by domestic manufacturers including raw materials used by chemical industry, (e.g. for import of Polyester Liquid Crystal Polymers for use in manufacture of connectors, the custom duty rate reduced from 7.5% to Nil).

However, it is pertinent to note that custom duty on following chemical industry related products have increased:
> Custom duty on Butyl Acrylate increased from 5% to 7.5%
> Custom duty on other prepared binders for foundry moulds or cores, chemical products and preparations of the chemical or allied industries increased from 10% to 17.5%.

Oil and gas industry
As far as oil and gas industry is concerned, from tax perspective, the Government has proposed to provide specific exemption to Indian Strategic Petroleum Reserves Limited (ISPRL) in respect of income accruing or arising as a result of arrangement for replenishment of crude oil stored in its storage facility. This is in pursuance to directions of the Central Government and subject to condition of replenishment of crude oil within three years.

The Finance Minister also proposed to reduce custom duty on few items related to oil and gas industry:
> Very low sulphur fuel oil meeting ISO 8217:2017 RMG380Viscosity in 220-400 CST standards/Marine Fuel 0.5% (FO) from 10% to 0%;
> Calcined Petroleum Coke from 10% to 7.5%
To deepen gas markets in India, the Government has been proposed to expand the national gas grid from the present 16,200 km to 27,000 km.

Pharmaceutical industry
The Government has paved the road ahead with ‘Pharma Vision 2020’ to catapult India’s contributions to the top of the global pharmaceuticals market. The Government is also streamlining its drug approval process and has amended the existing FDI policy to further tap into the potential of this sector.

The Government has identified that many mid-size pharma companies are successful domestically but not inexport markets and to boost such companies in export market, the Government has proposed to extend handholding support – for technology upgradations, R&D, business strategy, etc.

Further, to generate more opportunities for medical devices in domestic market the Government has proposed to impose 5% health cess on import of specified medical devices. The push for local medical equipment manufacturing will boost the devices industry.

Fertilizers industry
While there are no specific policy provisions for fertilizer industry, the Government has encouraged use of all kinds of fertilizers including the traditional organic and other innovative fertilizers to bring about a change in the prevailing regime that encourages excessive use of chemical fertilizers.

Science and technology
There are no specific policy provisions for the Science and Technology sector either. The Government has introduced new technology reform under the taxation laws in the form of e-appeal to impart greater efficiency, transparency, accountability and to ensure that the reforms initiated by the Government to eliminate human interface from the system reaches to the next level.

Healthcare industry
One of the key focus areas for this Budget 2020-21 on socio-welfare front is to widen the reach of affordable healthcare services.

Further, to promote domestic manufacturing of medical equipment, the Government has proposed to levy a health cess of 5% on the import of medical equipment (with certain exemptions). Proceeds from such a cess may be utilised towards building healthcare infrastructure in aspirational districts.

Other major Budget announcements
Personal tax
A new tax regime introduced to provide relief to certain taxpayers. The bill proposed to provide for an option to an individual and HUF taxpayers to apply lower tax rates as per new tax regime.

In order to prevent tax abuse, the Government has proposed to modify the provisions relating to residency for individual tax payers particularly Indian Citizens or Person of Indian Origin living outside India.

Further, to rationalize the tax treatment of employer’s contribution to recognized PFs, superannuation funds and National Pension Scheme, the limit of employer’s contribution towards aforesaid funds has been capped to INR 0.75 m in the previous year.

Corporate tax
Dividend Taxation
As a step to rationalize the provisions of the Act, the dividend distribution tax (DTT) has been proposed to abolish and the incidence of dividend taxation has been shifted in the hands of the recipient/shareholder. The domestic company or mutual fund will not be required to pay any additional tax on distribution of income. Further, on account of change in the dividend distribution tax regime, additional tax of 10% on individual shareholders has also been proposed to be abolished.

Rationalization of provisions for startups
The Government has proposed to defer perquisite taxation on exercise of ESOP for employees of eligible startups. Further, the turnover criteria for eligible startups to qualify for tax holiday has been proposed to increase to INR 100 crore (from the existing INR 25 crore).

Apart from the above, the flexibility has been provided to eligible startups to claim tax holiday for three consecutive years out of ten years from incorporation (from existing seven years).

Widening and Deepening of Tax Base
In order to widen and deepen the tax net by bringing participants of e-commerce within the tax net, withholding tax on e-commerce transactions @1% (5% if no PAN/Aadhaar) has been introduced whereby e-commerce operator is required to withhold tax on proceeds paid to e-commerce participant (i.e. seller).

A new provision related to levy of Tax Collection at Source (TCS) on (a) remittances made under Liberalized Remittance Scheme of RBI, (b) sale of overseas tour packages and (c) sale of goods has been introduced.

Further, the withholding tax rate on Fee for Technical Services (other than professional services) has also been reduced from 10% to 2%.

Removing Difficulties Faced by Taxpayers
In order to settle existing direct tax litigation, an alternative dispute resolution scheme “Vivad Se Vishwas Scheme” has been introduced by the Government. The scheme is introduced to provide complete waiver of interest and penalty where payment of disputed tax arrears is made by the tax payer on or before 31 March 2020.

The safe harbor limit for real estate transactions has been increased to 10% (existing 5%).
Further, it has also been proposed to extend relief to non-resident tax payers / foreign companies to furnish tax returns in India if income consists of royalty or FTS and appropriate taxes has been withheld in accordance with the withholding tax rates provided under the Act.

Other

  • To enhance effectiveness of tax administration e-appeals has been introduced
  • Turnover / gross receipts threshold limit for tax audit requirement increased from Rs 1 crore to Rs 5 crores in certain cases
  • Changes in due date for filing tax return, tax audit and transfer pricing report proposed:

 

Concluding Remarks
It seems attempts are made to create a win-win situation for both the Government (in achieving its aim of USD 5 trillion economy by year 2024) as well as for the public at large (with alterative taxation scheme for individuals and boost to start-ups). On a macro level, our Finance Minister has focused on building trust, bringing in certainty, attracting investments and in reducing litigation.

Chemical Industry Digest – February 2020

Chemical Industry Digest
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Chemical Industry Digest – February 2020

Articles covered in this issue:

Interview with AspenTech Bigwigs: Digital Solutions to Take Chemical Industry to the Next Level
– Antonio Pietri, Sanjeev Mullick, John Hague and Abhinav Chowdhary, AspenTech
Chemical Industry is going through a process of digitalization. Digitalization can help Chemical Industry create transformational changes to take the industry to the next level. Excerpts of the interesting interview.

Union Budget 2020
– Shailesh Monani, Amit Agrawal and Mansi Gada, PwC
A commentary on the recent Union Budget. Snapshots from the budget are presented in this report.

Waste to Chemicals
– Neil Iyer, GI Dynamics
The author explains ways of transforming waste into chemicals and fuels as in Europe and its relevance in India.

Pump Out Energy Loss
– Ven V. Venkatesan
Energy efficiency is an important aspect in plants as it is a barometer of the entire plant functioning. Huge amounts of wasted energy could find applications in various other systems if evaluated and utilized properly. This article gives a step-by-step approach to
increase efficiency and decrease loss.

Digital Technologies in Chemical Industries: Supply Chain
– Roch Gautier and Dr. Paige Marie Morse, AspenTech
This article discusses the role of digitalization to increase the efficiency of supply chain and deliver profitable outcomes in the Chemical Industry.

Quantum Computing – A Truly Disruptive Force for Chemicals?
– Stefan Guertzgen, SAP
Outlines how quantum computing is a disruptive development, a paradigm leap over
conventional computing. As it is just developing its potential and applications would
keep unfolding and it will have great effects in speeding up processes and creating breakthroughs in R&D in Chemical Industry.

Chemingineering – China’s Sneeze
– K Sahasranaman, Independent Consultant
China’s coronavirus has disrupted the global supply chain of the chemical industry by virtue of the fact that for many platform chemicals China is a major supplier with production capacities more than 60% of global capacity. Lot of lessons to be learnt by India and rest of the world for creating such over-dependence on China.

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