Ethylene, a key building block in plastic and vital to our country’s manufacturing industry, has been thrust into the spotlight due to Hurricane Harvey’s impact on its production process.
As American manufacturers champion their contributions to economic competitiveness and product innovation today, the industry has yet another reason to celebrate – U.S. manufacturing employment is still on the rise.
COVID-19 upended energy markets. Demand disappeared and producers scaled back. Now that economies are reopening, and the demand for goods and services is rebounding, the demand for energy all along the supply chain is increasing, driving up not only the cost of the feedstocks and fuels refineries and petrochemical manufacturers use, but also the cost of the energy used at every step of the supply chain.
One of the societal byproducts of the COVID-19 pandemic has been an increased emphasis on technology to meet changing needs, and the fuel and petrochemical industries are no exception to that trend.