Sid Richardson eyes Mexico for carbon black plant

FORT WORTH, Texas (June 9, 2015) — Sid Richardson Carbon & Energy Co. is planning to build a carbon black plant in Mexico to keep up with projected growth in North America.

Sid Richardson said it is hasn't yet determined the exact location of the plant, nor disclosed any information on capacity or investment, but did say it hopes to have the plant on line by 2017.

“Based on the current demand for carbon black in North America and projections for the next five years alone,” President and CEO Bill Jones said, “we are viewing this venture as a necessary move to serve our customers.”

He said the company hopes to have the plant on line and producing carbon black in 2017.

The factory would be Sid Richardson's first outside of the U.S., where it has plants in Addis, La., and Borger and Big Spring, Texas. Together the plants have a listed annual capacity of 413,000 metric tons.

The new plant would be the company's first since 1986, when it bought the plant in Borger.  

The company's identifying Mexico as the potential site for the new plant coincides with a buildup of tire manufacturing capacity in Mexico. Most prominent there is Goodyear's recent decision to build a plant in San Luis Potosi.

Earlier this year, a Sid Richardson executive warned that the U.S. tire industry will face a significant shortage of carbon black by 2020, due to a combination of increased domestic tire production and a stiff regulatory stance by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

Speaking at the 31st annual Clemson University Tire Industry Conference, held April 15-27 in Hilton Head Island, S.C., Leszek Nikiel, manager of Sid Richardson's Fort Worth, Texas, research center, said as much as one-fourth of U.S. carbon black production — mostly smaller plants — could be forced to close because of the EPA's enforcement of regulations on nitrogen oxide and sulfur oxide emissions.