The market demand for special engineering plastics is huge and my country’s supply capacity will continue to improve

Special engineering plastics are third-generation polymer materials with high added value. They are among the leading industries of the national economy, but their production scale is smaller than that of general-purpose plastics. Special engineering plastics have excellent heat resistance, corrosion resistance, acid and alkali resistance, hydrolysis resistance, chemical stability, etc., and are widely used in aerospace, electronic display, machinery, automobiles, national defense, medical and other fields.

There are many types of special engineering plastics, including polyphenylene sulfide (PPS), polyetheretherketone (PEEK), polyarylate (PAR), polysulfone (PSF), liquid crystal polymer (LCP), polyimide (PI) ). In recent years, with the advancement of domestic production technology, the import dependence of some special engineering plastics has continued to decline. For example, the import dependence of PI has dropped to about 24.8%. However, overall, the import dependence of most special engineering plastics is still high, such as The import dependence of polyetheretherketone is over 72.0%, and that of liquid crystal polymer (LCP) is around 80.0%.

According to the “2022-2026 Special Engineering Plastics Industry In-depth Market Research and Investment Strategy Suggestions Report released by the Industrial Research Center, special Engineering plastics manufacturers mainly include overseas companies such as DuPont, Dow, GE, BASF, and Mitsui Chemicals, as well as domestic companies such as Kingfa Technology, China Research Institute, Plite, and Vought. There is still a certain gap between domestic special engineering plastics manufacturers and overseas companies in terms of research and development, technology, innovation, brand, scale, etc. Therefore, many do not have competitive advantages in the high-end market.

In recent years, under the guidance of national policies, the number of special engineering plastics projects under construction and planned has increased, and the localization process has accelerated. For example, Watt Co., Ltd. has an annual output of 20,000 tons of LCP resin material projects and an annual output of 45,000 tons of special polymer materials projects. Kingfa Technology has added a new annual output of 15,000 tons of PA10T/PA6T synthetic resin projects. As relevant projects under construction, planned, and expansion are put into production, my country’s supply capacity of special engineering plastics will be further improved.

Special engineering plastics have excellent comprehensive properties. In recent years, the development trend of lightweight, high-end, miniaturization, and using steel instead of plastic has provided broad growth space for the development of the special engineering plastics industry. Taking polyetheretherketone as an example, driven by the development of new energy vehicles and electronic and electrical industries, my country’s polyetheretherketone market demand is growing rapidly, with an average annual compound growth rate of more than 38.6% from 2016 to 2021. In 2021, my country’s polyetherketone The market demand for ether ketone has grown to more than 15 million tons.

Industry analysts said that special engineering plastics have excellent comprehensive properties and a wide range of applications. With the development of new infrastructure, new energy vehicles, 5G, etc. With the development of the industry, the market space for special engineering plastics will continue to expand, and the industry development prospects are good. my country’s special engineering plastics market started late. Due to technical limitations, most special engineering plastics are still highly dependent on imports, and the industry as a whole is still in the early stages of development.