After the Japanese earthquake, Japan's Mitsubishi Engineering Plastics Corporation closed its 110,000-ton / year PC production plant in Kashima, Idemitsu's 47,000-ton / year PC plant in Chiba and its 75,000-ton / year upstream unit Phenol A plant also ceased production after the earthquake, coupled with rising costs of raw material bisphenol A, PC prices in Asia once rose. Strong demand and soaring prices have prompted capacity expansion projects to begin. First, Sinopec and Saudi Basic Industries Corporation (SABIC) announced that they will build a new 260,000-ton / year PC project in Tianjin, and Bayer announced that it will build a 200,000-ton / year PC production facility in Shanghai, and plans to invest 90 million euros to expand its PC capacity in Europe. In addition, SABIC Innovative Plastics Nansha plant has also added a new PC film production line, which is now in use and is expected to expand its production capacity in Asia from 2012 to 2014.

Analysis of market participants, the successive launch of capacity expansion projects of major manufacturers will change the tight situation of the PC. Taking the Chinese market as an example, SABIC ’s 260,000-ton / year PC unit in Jubail has been put into production in mid-March this year. It is expected that half of the output will be exported to the Chinese market in the third quarter. At the same time, Sinopec Mitsubishi Polycarbonate Corporation (SMP ) It is planned to build a 60,000-ton / year PC unit in Beijing by the end of the third quarter and put it into operation in the fourth quarter. Based on China ’s PC consumption of about 1.1 million tons in 2010, according to the current increase in China ’s PC capacity and consumer demand, it is estimated that the import volume will be about 969,000 tons, and the domestic market will be about 107,000 tons.

Although temporary overcapacity may occur in some regions, in the long run, global PC demand will continue to rise. According to Adrian Beale, a market analyst at the American Chemical Market Association, the global PC operating rate is expected to increase from about 80% to 90% between 2010 and 2015. Global PC demand in 2015 will increase from just under 8 billion pounds in 2010 to almost 10 billion pounds. "With the increasing popularity of digital media and the declining use of CDs and DVDs, electrical / electronics and films and plates will replace optical media as the largest market for PCs," said Andrew Bayer.

From the perspective of the global PC market, demand growth in Europe and the Asia-Pacific region is the most obvious. Guenter Hilken, Bayer MaterialScience's manager of the PC business, said that an important reason for the strong growth in demand in Europe is that more and more products are driven by technology. For example, in the electronics and entertainment industry, the EU requires LCD TV screens to comply with the "ecological "Label" standards and strict flame retardant regulations.

Compared with the European business, the growth in the Asia-Pacific region cannot be underestimated. According to ICIS Chemease statistics, by 2015 the Asia-Pacific region ’s global market share is expected to increase from the current 60% to 65%. According to Frost & Sullivan's forecast, the Chinese PC market will grow strongly in the next five years, with an average annual output growth rate of 9% and sales growth rate of 10%.