BUFFALO GROVE, IL, March 17, 2008 -- Dow Biocides, a business unit of The Dow Chemical Company, today announced it will increase its United States production capacity for glutaraldehyde by approximately 60 percent. The capacity is expected to be online and operational by Jan. 2009. Dow Biocides is one of the industry's largest suppliers of glutaraldehyde. Glutaraldehyde from Dow is produced at Institute, West Virginia, a site managed by Union Carbide Corporation, a wholly owned Dow Subsidiary.
"Glutaraldehyde is a widely-known, versatile and effective biocide used in formulations to protect against current or future microbial threats," said Mark Henning, general manager of Dow Biocides. "We anticipate growth in most geographies due to the multi-application use nature of glutaraldehyde. As the market leader for more than 50 years, we are now expanding our production capability to ensure we are well positioned to reliably meet our customers' growing supply requirements."
Dow glutaraldehyde has a broad regulatory coverage around the globe and
has one of the most studied and sustainable environmental profile of any
biocide available in the market. Glutaraldehyde is used in a number of
diverse markets that are core to Dow's growth strategies - from animal
biosecurity, oilfield, pulp and paper to cooling water and high level
disinfection.
"We are investing in the US due to the availability of critical raw and intermediate materials," said Henning. "In addition to making incremental expansions at the existing Dow asset, we are also investing in breakthrough process technology, to keep capital costs low and execute the expansion quickly and efficiently."
Glutaraldehyde from Dow Biocides is sold under a number of trademarks including: UCARCIDE, UCARSAN, AQUCAR, GLUTEX, and as industrial use product called Glutaraldehyde 25% and 50%. Dow also offers the glutaraldehyde products under at least 100 sub-registrations as customer branded products.
The increased capacity supports the future growth plans of Dow's Performance businesses, which includes Dow Biocides. Dow's glutaraldehyde capacity increase will also provide key enabling technology for several of Dow's market facing businesses.
"When customers choose to work with Dow, they tap in to our own competitive advantages of integration, global reach with a local presence, market knowledge and a depth of technological innovation and expertise," said Henning.
Dow Biocides offers a product for many types of microbial challenge and system requirement. The performance capabilities range from high to low pH performance, quick kill to sustained performance and a range of registrations unparalleled in the industry.
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