Corco's aromatics plant expansion comes on stream next month, Mr. Casey told a meeting in Houston of the Petro Group of the South Texas section of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers. Corco will provide about 6% of these needs and Phillips Petroleum the other 4 % from its Puerto Rican facilities. Puerto Rican purchases of manufactured goods from the U.S. were $1.45 billion in fiscal 1967 and exports were $1.1 billion. Canada's purchases were and are greater, but its population is 20 million, seven times greater than the 2.8 million of Puerto Rico, he pointed out. At the meeting, Mr. Casey also disclosed the latest of his company's chemical ventures—a plant, in partnership with TRW. The new plant will make a high vinyl polybutadiene for a new resins system called HYSTL, which Corco is developing. Butadiene for this plant will come from the core olefins plant of Corco and PPG Industries now under construction. This and other plants either already built, under construction, or planned will represent an investment of about $300 million by Corco. The various partners in projects with Corco will invest about $200 million in plants. The incentives to build in Puerto Rico are many, Mr. Casey said, but the basic one is tax exemption. At one time imported, lower-cost crude oil appeared to be an important incentive, but when lower labor productivity and high transportation costs are figured, tax exemption remains the most important. When the exemptions expire (times vary with location on the island) the top income tax rate could be 36.75%, if it stays at current rates. Most likely, Mr. Casey said, the exemptions would be allowed to run out even if Puerto Rico were to become a state. Statehood is at least 10 years off, even 15 years, he says. Corco's Casey Tax exemption is basic
JAPAN:
Investment in Graphite Union Carbide, attempting entry into Japan's graphite electrode industry, has just had one obstacle removed from its path by the Fair Trade Commission in Tokyo. In deciding that the company's proposed joint venture with Nippon Carbon Co. conforms with provision's of Japan's antimonopoly law, FTC has improved the prospects for a new tactic in the often difficult process of foreign direct investment in Japanese production firms. Early this year, the two companies agreed to form Shinnihon Carbon Co., a 50-50 venture to make high currentdensity electrodes for the steelmaking market, using Union Carbide technology (C&EN, March 3, page 10). An unusual feature of this contract was that Nippon Carbon, one of Japan's top three graphite electrode makers, would contribute its half of the new firm's equity in kind—meaning a transfer of most of its production facilities and personnel to the joint venture. The Ministry of International Trade and Industry, which must approve the contract before Union Carbide's investment can be validated, balked at the Japanese firm's proposal to invest in kind. The move comes close to buying into a going Japanese company, a sensitive point in Tokyo. (Japan's cautious edging toward liberalization of foreign investment is concerned mainly with formation of new companies, leaving acquisition of substantial interest in any existing firm to close case-by-case government screening.) Specifically, MITI charged that Nippon Carbon would in effect become a holding company, which is barred by the antimonopoly law. In February, the government's Foreign Investment Council validated Union Carbide's technical license agreement with the proposed joint venture, but postponed action on the venture itself in view of MITI's objections. FTC has now downed MITI's specific objection with its opinion, given to the Foreign Investment Council, that the Shinnihon Carbon Co. contract doesn't violate the relevant article of the antimonopoly law. Its opinion applies as well to Riken Norton Co., a venture later proposed along similar lines by Tokyo's Riken Corundum Co. and Norton Co. of Worcester, Mass. MITI enjoys wide latitude in judging a proposed venture's acceptability, and its opposition to Shinnihon Carbon may not end with FTC's holding company ruling. Should Shinnihon Carbon and Riken Norton be established, however, their equity pattern could be catching.
Ryan's liquid heat sink A use for 3M's electronic liquids
ELECTRONICS:
Fluids for Microcircuits "For a product whose growth rate has been slow but steady, we now see a rapid rate of growth and acceptance," a man from 3M Co. says. The product is 3M's Fluorinert electronic liquids—completely fluorinated fluids used as test bath mediums and heat sinks by the electronics industry. The main reason behind the expected boost in sales is the relatively new and first military microcircuitry test specifications. They call for use of the perfluorinated fluids. 3M's family of six clear, colorless, perfluorinated fluids differ with respect to their boiling points, ranging from 88° to 345° F. The liquids have a dielectric strength of more than 35,000 volts per 0.1-inch gap. The vaporphase dielectric strength is nearly the same as the liquid's, the St. Paulbased company claims. Also, the nonflammable liquids have a water and oil solubility of only a few parts per million and are compatible with even the most sensitive materials, according to 3M. As to disclosing exactly what the Fluorinert liquids are chemically, 3M is remaining its traditional ultrasecret self. The market they are capturing is now dominated by silicone oil, mineral oil, and glycerine. The greatest advantage of the more costly Fluorinert fluids is elimination of the timeconsuming step of cleaning electronic components' after they have been tested. The perfluorinated liquids drain rapidly off the test piece, and the last traces quickly evaporate leaving no residue. "The test piece is ready for immediate use, further processing, or for packaging and shipment to a customer," a 3M spokesman says. The fluids have been finding uses in the electronic industry for gross leak testing, integrated circuit testing, transistor matching, thermal shock tests, and printed circuit test. Besides use as test mediums, the fluids
