08/08/2025

C&EN’s Global Top 50 Chemical Firms for 2025

Chemical & Engineering News | Alexander Tullo | July 22, 2025

C&EN’s Global Top 50 chemical firms for 2025

Call it stalling out. Call it bumping along the bottom of the business cycle amid an industry downturn driven by oversupply and meager demand. But the global chemical industry hasn't been going anywhere recently, at least according to the data from C&EN's Global Top 50 survey.

The 50 companies in the ranking combined for $1.014 trillion in chemical sales in 2024, the year on which the ranking is based. This is a 0.07% decline from their total the year before. It is remarkable that the total sales of the world's 50 largest chemical companies could be nearly identical 2 years in a row.

But the lack of movement might be taken as an encouraging sign for the industry, given that in 2023 the companies posted a collective 10.7% decline in sales.

Another positive signal is earnings. The 37 companies in the Global Top 50 that report chemical earnings combined for profits of $56.8 billion for 2024—up 8.1% from 2023. The companies that reported earnings in last year's survey saw them tumble 44.1%.

Judging by companies' spending on the future—in the form of R&D and capital spending budgets—chemical executives are growing confident about their prospects. Capital spending, which includes outlays for maintenance and new projects, rose 3.5%, to $73,0 billion, among companies reporting those figures. R&D spending budgets increased 3.0%, to $12.3 billion.

But moves by individual companies—described in the profiles below—indicate that executives are in many ways managing their firms as if they were in an economic crisis. Many chemical companies are cutting back operations, particularly in Europe. High energy and other costs made petrochemical production in that region particularly vulnerable to the industry's slump.

For example, LyondellBasell Industries is basically giving away four petrochemical plants in Europe to a private equity firm rather than suffer additional losses at the sites. Dow is closing plants that make siloxanes, vinyls, and ethylene and is considering strategic options for its European polyurethane chemical business. Sabic, which recently announced the closures of two ethylene units in Europe, reportedly has its entire chemical business on the block.

Chemical firms in Asia have also been feeling the pinch and reorganizing. Japan's Resonac Holdings plans to spin off its petrochemical business. Mitsubishi Chemical Group is selling its pharmaceutical business to focus on specialty chemicals.

Earnings in the petrochemical sector were mixed last year but overall show signs of improvement. While some big petrochemical suppliers such as LyondellBasell and Dow posted declines in chemical operating income, firms such as ExxonMobil, Ineos, Sabic, Braskem, and Borealis reported gains.

The market may also be looking up for specialty chemical makers. Although Arkema posted a decline in earnings, both Evonik Industries and DSM-Firmenich swung from a loss in 2023 to a profit in 2024.

The specialty chemical maker Asahi Kasei posted a posted a profit increase of more than 100% . Earnings at all the other Japanese firms in the Global Top 50—including Mitsubishi Chemical, Mitsui Chemical, Resonac, Shin-Etsu Chemical, Sumitomo Chemical, and Toray Industries—also improved in 2024.

Chinese chemical makers, which have been rising up the ranking in recent years because of their enormous growth, mostly stalled. Sinopec, Rongsheng Petrochemical, Hengli, and Jiangsu Eastern Shenghong all posted relatively flat sales. Wanhua Chemical Group, PetroChina, and Xinfengming posted modest increases. Tongkun was an outlier with a more-than-20% increase.

 

1. BASF
2024 chemical sales: $70.6 billion

BASF is the largest chemical company in the world for the sixth consecutive year, but it might not remain so in the future if a major overhaul of its portfolio goes according to plan. Last September, Markus Kamieth, who had recently taken over as CEO, launched a strategy that could have the German firm shedding its agrochemical, battery materials, coating, and emissions catalyst units. The businesses combine for about $28 billion in annual sales. BASF plans to spin off its agrochemical business and is evaluating options for the other divisions. It will retain businesses in chemicals, performance materials, industrial solutions, nutrition, and personal care. "We want to be—and remain—a chemical company at our core. This is our DNA," Kamieth said at the time. Separately, BASF announced in January that it would sell its business making food ingredients such as emulsifiers, aeration agents, and omega-3 oils to the food processor Louis Dreyfus.

 

2. SINOPEC
2024 chemical sales: $58.1 billion

China's largest chemical maker, state-owned Sinopec, is taking a big step out of its home country with a project in Yanbu, Saudi Arabia. With Saudi Aramco, Sinopec plans to build a petrochemical complex that will have the capacity to make 1.8 million metric tons (t) of ethylene and 1.5 million t of aromatics per year as raw materials for a host of derivatives. Sinopec has a slate of ambitious domestic projects as well. In December, it reached mechanical completion on a $4.6 billion complex at Zhenhai Refining and Chemical, one of its subsidiaries, that consists mainly of a refinery and a propane dehydrogenation plant. Also last year, the company started up a 1.2-million-t-per-year ethylene cracker and downstream derivatives complex in Tianjin that cost over $2 billion. And Sinopec is building an ethylene complex in Zhenhai, an aromatics plant in Jiujiang, and an ethylene cracker in Maoming.

3. DOW
2024 chemical sales: $43.0 billion

Dow prides itself on its low production costs compared with competitors. But the chemical industry's "lower-for-longer" downturn, which is how CEO Jim Fitterling describes an unprecedented period of overcapacity that could persist until the end of the decade, is forcing the company to scale back. In October, Dow launched a review of its struggling polyurethane raw materials plants in Europe that could culminate in the sale of those assets. The company is also shutting down its ethylene cracker in Böhlen, Germany; its chlor-alkali and vinyl assets in Schkopau, Germany; and its siloxane plant in Barry, Wales. As part of these closures and an earlier round of cuts, Dow is cutting its global workforce by about 6%, or 2,300 jobs. It is also postponing its $6.5 billion Path2Zero project in Fort Saskatchewan, Alberta. Dow's flagship initiative of the 2020s, Path2Zero involves building an ethylene cracker heated by low-carbon hydrogen instead of hydrocarbons. The delay will help the firm save $1 billion in capital costs this year Dow executives will decide by the end of the year whether to ramp up construction in 2026.

4. PETROCHINA
2024 chemical sales: $42.8 billion

Posting rises in both sales and profits last year, PetroChina continues to show improvement in the chemical business despite tough market conditions. But the oil company's profit margins in chemicals, at about 1%, remain razor thin. Undaunted, PetroChina has big projects under construction. It is spending $4.7 billion and $4.2 billion on olefin-based chemical complexes at its Jilin Petrochemical and Guangxi Petrochemical subsidiaries, respectively. The company says the Jilin project will be powered completely by renewable electricity. PetroChina is also building an ethylene cracker at its Dushanzi Petrochemical subsidiary in western China.

5. EXXONMOBIL
2024 chemical sales: $41.1 billion

Investment has cooled amid a long downturn in the petrochemical industry in North America. ExxonMobil may be bucking the trend. The company recently filed for local tax breaks in Calhoun County, Texas, for an $8.6 billion ethylene cracker complex. The project is merely promised at this point, and the firm says in its application that it might invest elsewhere instead. ExxonMobil and Sabic opened a similar project in Corpus Christi, Texas, in 2021. In another major initiative, ExxonMobil announced in December that it would invest $200 million to build plastics recycling facilities based on its pyrolysis technology at its sites in Baytown and Beaumont, Texas. The company opened its first such facility in Baytown in 2022. The investments will bring its total capacity to recycle plastic waste to 230,000 metric tons per year when the plants start up in 2026.

6. SABIC
2024 chemical sales: $37.3 billion

The European petrochemical industry is facing its most severe downturn in ages and no prospects in sight for a turnaround before the end of the decade. According to published reports based on sources familiar with the matter, Sabic has engaged with investment bankers to explore a possible sale of its European petrochemical business. This would be more of a departure from the region than the sales and shutdowns undertaken by peers like Dow or LyondellBasell Industries. Sabic's move would not be out of the blue. The Saudi firm recently closed one of its crackers in Geleen, the Netherlands, and announced last month that it was closing a cracker in Teesside, England.

7. LG CHEM
2024 chemical sales: $35.9 billion

Slower-than-expected market adoption of electric vehicles and governments' ebbing enthusiasm have dimmed the growth outlook for lithium-ion batteries from just a few years ago. This is bad news for South Korea's LG Chem, which has built up an enormous battery materials franchise. In the wake of an 11.5% decline in sales in 2024, LG is reining in expansion plans. For example, it had aimed to increase its annual cathode materials capacity from 120,000 metric tons (t) in 2023 to 280,000 t by 2026. Earlier this year, the company disclosed it is now targeting 170,000 t. In another setback, LG and the agricultural firm ADM canceled plans last year to build biobased lactic acid and polylactic acid joint ventures in Decatur, Illinois, because construction costs had "skyrocketed" from initial estimates. In an advance in biobased materials, LG recently began synthesizing acrylic acid from fermentation-derived 3-hydroxypropionic acid.

8.  LYONDELLBASELL INDUSTRIES
2024 chemical sales: $32.2 billion

After a review of its European petrochemical business, LyondellBasell Industries is essentially paying a private equity firm to take four sites off its hands. The industrial turnaround specialist Aequita is acquiring LyondellBasell's ethylene complexes in Berre, France, and Münchsmünster, Germany, as well as polypropylene plants in Carrington, England, and Tarragona, Spain. LyondellBasell is contributing about $300 million to the business, though it could make back $115 million of that in profits if the business does well. LyondellBasell says the transaction is justified because the sites have been losing money and cost $125 million annually in upkeep. The sale isn't LyondellBasell's only downsize in the region. The firm's site in Brindisi, Italy, remains under review. And the company and its partner, Covestro, announced in March that they are closing their propylene oxide-styrene plant in Maasvlakte, the Netherlands. LyondellBasell is expanding in lower-cost regions. It plans to build a metathesis unit—which will make propylene from ethylene—in Channelview, Texas. It is also conducting a feasibility study for an ethylene cracker complex it would build in Saudi Arabia with Sipchem.

9.  INEOS
2024 chemical sales: $31.2 billion

Ethylene furnaces have been arriving in Antwerp, Belgium, from a factory in Thailand. These gargantuan units are dramatic proof that construction on Ineos's Project One petrochemical plant is well underway. Project One will be an important test for the chemical industry in Europe, which hasn't seen a new cracker in decades. Unlike other plants in the region, which generally crack crude oil–based naphtha to make ethylene, Ineos's unit will crack cheap ethane imported from the US. Though it is building the Antwerp cracker, Ineos has shuttered production elsewhere. The company said in June that it would close a phenol plant in Germany, and it is closing its acrylonitrile-butadiene-styrene polymer plant in Ohio because of cheap overseas imports. Environmental restrictions forced the firm's Styrolution affiliate to close its Sarnia, Ontario, styrene plant, which had operated since World War II.

10.  LINDE
2024 chemical sales: $30.7 billion

Linde is on a growth push, boasting a $10.4 billion pipeline of projects under development. The largest of these—in fact, the German industrial gas firm's largest project ever—is a $2 billion investment in Alberta to build an autothermal reformer that will convert off-gases from a Dow ethylene cracker into hydrogen, though Dow has postponed the project because of market conditions. If the project does move forward, Linde will capture the carbon dioxide emissions for storage underground; Dow will use the hydrogen to fuel its ethylene furnaces. Linde has a similar agreement to supply low-carbon hydrogen for an ammonia plant that Woodside Energy is building in Beaumont, Texas. That project will require a $1.8 billion investment in an autothermal reformer and other

11.  FORMOSA PLASTICS
2024 chemical sales: $30.3 billion

Like many petrochemical makers in Asia, Formosa Plastics has been struggling with overcapacity because of huge projects in mainland China. Three of the Taiwanese firm's constituent companies—Formosa Petrochemical, Formosa Plastics, and Formosa Chemicals & Fibre—posted narrow operating losses in 2024. Its polyester subsidiary, Nan Ya Plastics, showed a slim profit. Formosa Petrochemical's $9.4 billion project in Louisiana, originally announced a decade ago has faced stiff local opposition and legal challenges. But in a victory for the company last September, the Louisiana Supreme Court upheld the complex's air permits. A year ago, Formosa Plastics announced a "major expansion" of its polyvinyl chloride plant in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, though it didn't disclose the size of the project.

12.  AIR LIQUIDE
2024 chemical sales: $28.8 billion

Producing low-carbon hydrogen has been a dominant theme at the French industrial gas giant. Earlier this year, it inked a deal to supply 45,000 metric tons (t) of hydrogen made using renewable power to the French oil company TotalEnergies. Most of this hydrogen will come from a $600 million water electrolyzer the companies will build together in Zeeland, the Netherlands. Air Liquide will also supply hydrogen from an electrolyzer previously planned for the Netherlands. The agreement builds on another contract between the two firms in which Air Liquide will make hydrogen from biogas at a TotalEnergies biorefinery in France. That unit will cost more than $80 million and produce about 25,000 t of hydrogen that Total will use to make biofuels. Air Liquide is planning a plant in Belgium that will produce hydrogen by cracking ammonia.

13.  SYNGENTA GROUP
2024 chemical sales: $26.9 billion

The Sinochem Holdings–owned agricultural chemical and seed firm aims to increase its emphasis on high-value products. Part of this strategy is plunging deeper into biological crop protection. Syngenta Group is acquiring a repository of natural products and genetic strains from the pharmaceutical firm Novartis. The purchase includes research staff and a pilot fermentation unit in Switzerland. Syngenta is also partnering with the start-up Provivi to develop pheromones that regulate the mating behavior of yellow stem borers and armyworm, two pests that inflict damage on crops in Asia. In addition, it has teamed up with Ginkgo Bioworks to improve an agriculturally useful microbial strain.

14. RONGSHENG PETROCHEMICAL
2024 chemical sales: $26.4 billion

Rongsheng Petrochemical has led the trend in China of building massive oil-to-chemical complexes centered on refineries geared to producing chemicals rather than fuels. But Rongsheng's quick climb up the Global Top 50 ranking stalled in 2024 as chemical sales were flat with those of 2023. The company started work last year on Jintang New Materials, a complex that has a budget of about $11 billion and is designed to bring Rongsheng into specialty chemicals and low-carbon technologies. The firm has also been busy in the lab. It is running pilot-scale tests of a technology to oligomerize ethylene into 1-octene, a monomer used to make linear low-density polyethylene.

15. WANHUA CHEMICAL GROUP
2024 chemical sales: $25.3 billion

This Chinese company calls itself the world's largest producer of the polyurethane raw material methylene diphenyl diisocyanate (MDI). And Wanhua Chemical Group is still expanding in this sector. Last year it completed an expansion of 400,000 metric ton (t) per year in Fujian, China, and a 300,000 t capacity increase in Ningbo, China. Another 700,000 t expansion in Fujian will raise Wanhua's total MDI capacity to 4.5 million t per year. Wanhua completed a low-density polyethylene plant in Yantai, China, earlier this year. It has also hooked up with a foreign backer and potential feedstock supplier, Petrochemical Industries Company of Kuwait, which has agreed to purchase a 25% stake in one of Wanhua's affiliates, Wanhua Chemical (Yantai) Petrochemical, for $638 million. The deal is similar to Saudi Aramco's 10% purchase of China's Rongsheng Petrochemical in 2023.

16.  RELIANCE INDUSTRIES
2024 chemical sales: $25.0 billion

The Indian conglomerate has begun a project that it says will make it the fifth-largest polyvinyl chloride (PVC) producer in the world. Reliance Industries will construct PVC and chlorinated PVC plants in Nagothane and Dahej, India, that will have combined capacity of 1.5 million metric tons (t) per year; it will also build chlor-alkali and ethylene dichloride plants in Dahej. The company expects to complete the projects by 2027. Reliance has also finished the technical design work for a project to expand specialized polyester capacity by 1 million t. The firm continues to tap into cheap ethane extracted from US natural gas shale to reduce the cost of olefin production in India. To further that strategy, Reliance is increasing its fleet of ethane-carrying ships from six to nine.

17.  MITSUBISHI CHEMICAL GROUP
2024 chemical sales: $24.8 billion

Mitsubishi Chemical Group is trying to find its footing in a challenging time for Japanese chemical makers. In 2023, the company dropped a plan to spin off its petrochemical unit, opting instead to improve the business internally. It is now selling its pharmaceutical business, Mitsubishi Tanabe Pharma, to the private equity firm Bain Capital for $3.3 billion. At a press conference announcing the deal, Mitsubishi Chemical CEO Manabu Chikumoto said a gradual shift away from small-molecule drugs had eroded the synergies between the firm's drug and chemical businesses. Mitsubishi will put proceeds from the sale toward specialty chemicals, which have been a bright spot for the firm. Separately, Mitsubishi canceled plans to build a methyl methacrylate plant in the US. The company has had plans to build the facility, which would have used a novel technology to make the acrylic monomer from ethylene, since 2014.

18.  HENGLI PETROCHEMICAL
2024 chemical sales: $21.3 billion

Hengli Petrochemical is one of several Chinese chemical makers built on the model of running large, integrated refining and petrochemical complexes. It operates a refinery in Dalian, China, with 20 million metric tons (t) of crude oil processing capacity. Eager to tap into a chemical producer of such massive scale, the oil company Saudi Aramco disclosed in April 2024 that it was negotiating the purchase of a 10% stake in Hengli. But the companies have yet to announce the completion of such a deal, which was last mentioned in an Aramco press release in September. Aramco bought a 10% stake in Hengli rival Rongsheng Petrochemical in 2023 for $3.4 billion. Hengli continues to advance on its own. Last year, the company completed a $3 billion project to build plants with 1.6 million t per year of capacity to make bisphenol A, polycarbonate, propylene glycol, ethanolamines, ethylene amines, acetic acid, and other chemicals. Hengli is also working on expansions in polybutylene succinate and lithium-ion battery separators.

19.  SHIN-ETSU CHEMICAL
2024 chemical sales: $16.9 billion

Shin-Etsu Chemical's US polyvinyl chloride arm, Shintech, continues to build capacity. Last year, Shintech filed permits with the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality for an ethane-based ethylene cracker in Plaquemine with 500,000 metric tons of annual capacity. The firm may build chlor-alkali and ethylene dichloride plants there as well. In 2024, it completed a $1.25 billion integrated polyvinyl chloride complex in Plaquemine. And in 2019, it started up a $1.4 billion ethylene cracker thereto back-integrate its vinyl production. The Japanese company invests in other businesses as well. For instance, it is spending $67 million on its pharmaceutical cellulose business, largely through the construction of a plant in Germany that will make hydroxypropyl cellulose.

20. EVONIK INDUSTRIES
2024 chemical sales: $16.4 billion

Evonik Industries' restructuring has been proceeding slowly. Back in 2022, the company said it would divest the businesses in its performance materials segment. Three years later, that effort still isn't complete, as the German specialty chemical maker hasn't found a buyer for the C4 chemicals business. The company did sell its superabsorbent polymers business—which has annual sales of about $1 billion—to International Chemical Investors Group last year. That firm had previously bought other parts of the segment. Evonik rolled out another portfolio-trimming plan in October that includes the closure of a keto acids plant in Germany. It also plans to sell its polyester coating and adhesive unit and is folding its polyolefin business into the C4 business.

21.  INDORAMA VENTURES
2024 chemical sales: $15.5 billion

Thanks to severe overbuilding of polyester capacity in China, times have been rough for Indorama Ventures, a Thai petrochemical producer. Indorama sold its purified terephthalic acid (PTA) plant in Portugal, which had been idle for 2 years, for scrap to an unnamed buyer. Last September, the company announced it was closing a PTA plant in Montreal and a complex in the Netherlands that makes PTA and polyethylene terephthalate (PET). Looking to distinguish itself from competitors, Indorama has concentrated on sustainability in recent years. For example, it is building two PET recycling plants in India with a local Pepsi bottler.

22.  COVESTRO
2024 chemical sales: $15.3 billion

Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC) is buying Covestro for $16.3 billion. The German producer of polyurethane raw materials and polycarbonate will be the centerpiece of ADNOC's plan to diversify away from oil and gas. ADNOC has also purchased fertilizer maker Fertiglobe and is working out a deal to combine three firms affiliated with the Abu Dhabi government—Borealis, Borouge, and Nova Chemicals—into a single global petrochemical producer. With ownership of a major European chemical maker like Covestro, ADNOC will have to confront the challenges of the region's relatively high costs. Covestro and partner LyondellBasell Industries announced in March that they were closing their propylene oxide and styrene joint venture in the Netherlands, in operation since 2003. Covestro still invests in Europe when the opportunity is right. For example, earlier this year it completed upgrades at its toluene diisocyanate (TDI) plant in Germany. A new reactor captures reaction heat to generate steam, reducing energy consumption by 80% compared with conventional TDI plants.

23.  JIANGSU EASTERN SHENGHONG
2024 chemical sales: $15.3 billion

Some 70% of the output at Jiangsu Eastern Shenghong's oil-to-chemical complex in Lianyungang, China, is petrochemicals—a level the firm says is the highest among such facilities in the country. Jiangsu also claims to be the largest producer of recycled polyester fiber in the world, with 600,000 metric tons (t) of annual capacity. This year the company took another step in the greening of polyester. It started producing ethylene glycol made from captured carbon, which it uses to make a carbon-sequestering polyester. Jiangsu has big projects in the works, including an acetic acid plant, with 1 million t per year of capacity, and a purified terephthalic acid unit. In a setback for the firm, Jiangsu shelved a project, budgeted at nearly $1 billion, to build a plant to make the biodegradable polymer poly(butylene adipate-co-terephthalate). 

24.  LOTTE CHEMICAL
2024 chemical sales: $15.0 billion

Like many large chemical companies, South Korea's Lotte Chemical is undertaking a raft of sustainability initiatives. In Ulsan, South Korea, the company completed testing an electric ammonia cracking system designed by Syzygy Plasmonics. The initiative is meant to pave the way for use of ammonia as a hydrogen carrier. Lotte is also supplying recycled plastics for the Samsung Galaxy S25 phone. The device will incorporate nylon from fishing nets and polycarbonate recovered from trays used in computer chip fabrication. Like many Asian chemical makers, Lotte has scaled back some noncore operations. In February, it signed a deal to sell its purified terephthalic acid (PTA) in Port Qasim, Pakistan, to AsiaPak Investments. The plant is the only PTA producer in the country. Lotte is also dissolving its Malaysian synthetic rubber operations.

25.  TORAY INDUSTRIES
2024 chemical sales: $14.9 billion

A major synthetic fiber producer based in Japan, Toray Industries is reacting to stiff foreign competition by trying to move into lines of business unexplored by others. It is working with Thailand's PTT Global Chemical to scale up a biobased route to adipic acid, a raw material for nylon 6,6. In their process, the companies will ferment sugars into muconic acid. A subsequent hydrogenation process will yield adipic acid. In 2024, Toray wrapped up a polyphenylene sulfide expansion in South Korea. And the company expanded its world-leading carbon fiber business recently through the purchase of a thermoplastic composite tape business from Colorado-based Gordon Plastics.

26.  BRASKEM
2024 chemical sales: $14.4 billion

Late last year, the Brazilian chemical maker got a new CEO, Roberto Prisco Paraiso Ramos, who came to Braskem after running the offshore oil specialist Ocyan. Ramos shows signs he'll take a conservative approach to leading Braskem. At a recent petrochemical conference, he talked down a previously heralded Braskem plan to make polypropylene from ethanol in the US. "I am not convinced this can work and one can make money off of it," Ramos said. The company is still considering a joint venture for making biobased ethylene glycol from corn dextrose in Indiana. It is also expanding capacity for ultra-high-molecular-weight polyethylene in La Porte, Texas. The investment is targeted at battery separator applications.

27.  SUMITOMO CHEMICAL
2024 chemical sales: $13.9 billion

Business is starting to pick up for Japanese chemical makers, and many enjoyed better profitability in the fiscal year ending in March than they did in the prior year. Sumitomo Chemical's turnaround was more dramatic than most, swinging from a small loss to a profit of nearly $500 million. The company has been trimming activities to improve efficiency. Last November, it announced a reduction of low-density polyethylene capacity in Ichihara City, Japan. Another firm, Maruzen Petrochemical, is closing an ethylene cracker in Chiba, Japan, and consolidating production at its ethylene joint venture with Sumitomo. In an expansion move, Sumitomo plans to build a plant in Texas to make high-purity isopropyl alcohol, a solvent used in semiconductor fabrication.

28. YARA
2024 chemical sales: $13.9 billion

In what could be a bellwether for green hydrogen and ammonia, Yara said in October that it was putting on the back burner green hydrogen projects at its sites in Porsgrunn, Norway, and Sluiskil, the Netherlands. Yara opened a demonstration plant in Porsgrunn in 2024 that makes ammonia from green hydrogen, and it had been considering a broader electrification at the plant. The Dutch company maintains that for such projects to move forward, the supply of renewable electricity—used to split water into hydrogen and oxygen—has to be "the right price." Yara is proceeding with a carbon capture and storage project in Sluiskil and is considering separate low-carbon ammonia projects in the US with partners Enbridge and BASF.

29. DSM-FIRMENICH
2024 chemical sales: $13.8 billion

The result of a merger between DSM and Firmenich in 2023, DSM-Firmenich is now jettisoning the noncore businesses in its portfolio. In June, the firm completed the sale of its share in an animal feed enzyme joint venture to its partner Novonesis for $1.6 billion. DSM-Firmenich aims to exit animal feed products and sell the rest of its business. Last October, the company sold its yeast extract business to the fermentation specialist Lesaffre and a fish oil business to KD Pharma.

30. TONGKUN HOLDING GROUP
2024 chemical sales: $13.7 billion

Owing to an astonishing 23% increase in sales, Tongkun Holding Group has rocketed up the Global Top 50 from number 37 a year ago. The Chinese company is a giant, operating 13.5 million metric tons per year of polyester filament capacity. Tongkun is planning a large complex in Indonesia that would include an oil refinery and an ethylene cracker. Another Global Top 50 firm from China, Xinfengming Group, has also signed onto that project.

31. DUPONT
2024 chemical sales: $12.4 billion

DuPont announced plans in May 2024 to split into three companies. The largest would have housed traditional DuPont brands like Kevlar polyaramid and Tyvek polyethylene fabrics. A second company was to specialize in electronic materials, and a third was to get all of DuPont's water treatment products. But DuPont executives decided that the high-growth water business was a better fit with the traditional business after all, and they canceled the separation. DuPont is still pursuing the spin-off of the electronic materials business this November under the name Qnity Electronics. That company would have had $4.3 billion in sales in 2024: about 57% from semiconductor materials such as lithography chemicals and chemical mechanical planarization slurries and the rest from interconnect materials like packaging and thermal management products.

32. CHEVRON PHILLIPS CHEMICAL
2024 chemical sales: $12.1 billion

Chevron Phillips Chemical may soon get a change in ownership. The US company has been an island of stability since it was formed 25 years ago, when Chevron and Phillips Petroleum combined their petrochemical businesses into a 50-50 joint venture. Now a major Phillips shareholder, Elliott Investment Management, is prodding the company to divest its stake. Elliott argues that Chevron Phillips has good prospects and low production costs, but owning a stake makes Phillips too much of a conglomerate. Chevron, keen on diversifying, has stated it is interested in exercising its option to buy out its partner.

33. AIR PRODUCTS AND CHEMICALS
2024 chemical sales: $12.1 billion 

CEO Seifi Ghasemi's emphasis on low-carbon hydrogen products drove Air Products and Chemicals shareholders to mutiny. Last year, activist investor Mantle Ridge started pressuring the company to focus on its core industrial gas business and to come up with a succession plan for the 80-year-old Ghasemi. Mantle Ridge won a proxy battle that ousted Ghasemi at the company's annual meeting in January. New CEO Eduardo Menezes—who once worked for the Air Products rival Linde—swiftly cut three big capital projects, booking a charge to earnings of $3.1 billion. One of the canceled efforts was a plant in Massena, New York, that would have used hydroelectric power to run a water electrolysis plant to make green hydrogen. But Air Products had started changing direction even before Ghasemi departed. For example, in December it pulled out of a $4 billion green hydrogen project in Texas. On the other hand, its low-carbon hydrogen project for Neom, a planned city in Saudi Arabia, is 80% complete.

34. MITSUI CHEMICALS
2024 chemical sales: $11.9 billion

One of Japan's largest diversified chemical makers, Mitsui Chemicals could shortly become a lot smaller. The company is considering splitting off its petrochemical unit, which is responsible for 39% of its sales, by 2027. Mitsui aims to focus on the specialty chemical sector, which for Japanese companies has been a safe harbor from the gigantic petrochemical complexes recently built in China. Mitsui says independence will allow the petrochemical business to pursue partnerships with similar firms and become more efficient. Mitsui and Idemitsu Kosan have already been planning to consolidate ethylene production in Chiba, Japan. Idemitsu will close its cracker there and draw ethylene from Mitsui's unit.

35. HENGYI PETROCHEMICAL
2024 chemical sales: $11.8 billion

Hengyi Petrochemical's motto is "One drop of oil, two strands of fiber." The Chinese company takes in crude oil, refines it in a massive complex in Brunei, and makes derivatives like polyester and nylon fiber in China. Hengyi is working on two big projects: In Brunei it will increase throughput from 8 million metric tons (t) to 11 million t per year. The expansion will include an ethylene cracker and purified terephthalic acid capacity. Hengyi is also building a 1.2 million t caprolactam and nylon facility in Qinzhou, China.

36. SIBUR
2024 chemical sales: $11.2 billion

This marks the first time the Russian petrochemical giant has made the Global Top 50 ranking. Sibur, which primarily produces polymers and elastomers for its domestic market, has grown in recent years. In 2023, it purchased the stake of its partner Solvay in their RusVinyl joint venture. Non-Russian firms were pulling out of the country at the time, after its invasion of Ukraine. Sibur announced plans last year to build a $2 billion styrene and polystyrene facility in Nizhnekamskneftekhim, Russia.

37. MOSAIC
2024 chemical sales: $11.1 billion

Mosaic, which primarily produces phosphate and potash fertilizers, is divesting noncore assets. Late last year, the US company sold its 25% share in Ma'aden Wa'ad Al Shamal Phosphate Company, a Saudi Arabian phosphate producer, to Saudi Arabia Mining Company. Mosaic received $1.5 billion in Saudi Arabia Mining's stock and expects to record a $500 million gain from the sale. It also agreed to sell a phosphate mine in Brazil to the local firm Fosfatados Centro for $125 million.

38. BAYER
2024 chemical sales: $11.1 billion

European commodity chemical makers aren't the only ones being pressured by cheap imports from China. The agrochemical maker Bayer Crop Science is also feeling the pinch. The company is ending production of some generic active ingredients for pesticides in Dormagen, Germany, which will result in the loss of 200 jobs at the site. The firm is also shutting an herbicide plant in Frankfurt, Germany, that employs 500 people. Bayer expects to complete both moves in 2028.

39. ARKEMA
2024 chemical sales: $10.3 billion

Earlier this year, Arkema moved into a new headquarters in La Défense, France, just outside Paris. The building incorporates many Arkema materials: The paints contain Arkema resins. Arkema's nylon 11 is used in the furniture. And adhesives from its Bostik unit are applied all over the structure. The French specialty chemical maker is carrying out minor industrial expansions as well. For example, it is spending $20 million to expand polyvinylidene fluoride capacity in Kentucky by 15%. Demand for the material in lithium-ion batteries, semiconductor manufacturing, and other applications prompted the investment. Separately, Arkema announced in January that it would halt production of chlorine, methyl chloride, and technical fluids in Jarrie, France, after Vencorex, a supplier of a special salt that Arkema needed at the site, stopped production.

40.  CELANESE
2024 chemical sales: $10.3 billion

Celanese has hit a rough patch. Sales fell by 6% and operating profits dropped by nearly 15% last year, largely because of slow demand from the auto industry—a key customer of the US company's engineering polymer business. In December, Celanese abruptly announced that Lori Ryerkerk, who had led the company since 2019, was stepping down at the end of the month. She was replaced by Scott Richardson, Celanese's chief operating officer. Richardson has set about cutting and divesting some smaller businesses. The firm is already closing the Mylar Specialty Films joint venture with Teijin in Luxembourg. In May, Celanese announced its intention to divest its Micromax family of inks and pastes, which are used in electronics. That business generates annual sales of about $300 million.

41. SHELL
2024 chemical sales: $9.6 billion

Shell is eyeing an exit from most chemicals by the end of the decade, executives at the oil company disclosed at an investor event in March. Shell's assets in Europe are slated for possible closure, and the firm could sell or find a partner for its new ethylene and polyethylene complex in Monaca, Pennsylvania. Shell sold its Singapore chemical complex—its largest in Asia—to Chandra Asri Capital and Glencore Asian Holdings in April 2024. But Shell doesn't plan to exit chemicals in China. In fact, Shell and its partner China National Offshore Oil announced in January that they are planning a third ethylene cracker at their joint venture in Daya Bay, China. At the event in March, Shell chief financial officer Sinead Gorman said that Shell's Chinese operations are "locally financed" and that it has a partner that "knows how to build the stuff and manufacture it well."

42. NUTRIEN
2024 chemical sales: $9.6 billion

Ken Seitz, Nutrien's CEO, doesn't think low-carbon ammonia is a worthwhile investment. The US company canceled a carbon capture and storage project at its Geismar, Louisiana, complex last year, which resulted in a $195 million charge to its earnings. "At this point, these prospective investments have become less attractive within our capital allocation framework as we do not have clarity on regulatory policies or see financially material opportunities for products with a lower carbon intensity," Seitz recently wrote to shareholders. Instead, Nutrien launched small conventional expansion projects at its nitrogen fertilizer plants in Geismar and in Redwater, Alberta. Meanwhile, the firm's 50% stake in the Argentine fertilizer maker Profertil, which generated $667 million in sales in 2024, remains unsold more than a year after Nutrien put it up for sale.

43. EASTMAN CHEMICAL
2024 chemical sales: $9.4 billion

Eastman Chemical executives got an unpleasant surprise in May, when the US Department of Energy (DOE) proposed pulling $375 million in financial support for a planned polyethylene terephthalate (PET) recycling plant in Longview, Texas. The measure was part of a round of funding cancellations for projects that the agency said were not economically viable. The Longview facility, if Eastman proceeds with it, would cost $1.2 billion overall. It will use Eastman's methanolysis-based depolymerization technology, which is also used at a plant the company started up at its Kingsport, Tennessee, headquarters facility in 2024. Only a few weeks before the DOE announcement, Eastman CEO Mark Costa was enthusiastic about prospects for the project. He told analysts that "we feel very good about where we are with the DOE" and that he thought the Longview project aligned with the Donald J. Trump administration's manufacturing goals. Eastman is also planning a PET recycling facility in France.

44. XINFENGMING GROUP
2024 chemical sales: $9.3 billion

One remarkable aspect of the rise of the Chinese petrochemical industry is how much of it is dedicated to polyester fibers for textiles. The country has 86 million metric of tons of annual polyester capacity, according to the consulting firm CCF Group. That's about three-quarters of the global total. Xinfengming Group alone has roughly 10% of Chinese capacity. The firm dedicated a new headquarters building last year; it is interested in overseas expansion and may participate in Tongkun Holding Group's Indonesian petrochemical project.

45. RESONAC HOLDINGS
2024 chemical sales: $9.2 billion

The Japanese chemical maker is spinning off its petrochemical business into a new company called Crasus Chemical. Resonac Holdings says the business has too little integration between monomers and downstream derivatives. Separately, the company is working with Microwave Chemical on using microwave radiation to break down postconsumer plastic waste. The firms hope to establish pilot production of several thousand tons per year. Resonac is also selling its stake in Minaris Regenerative Medicine, a contract development and manufacturing operation, to Altaris, a private equity firm specializing in health care.

46. ASAHI KASEI
2024 chemical sales: $9.0 billion

Asahi Kasei continues to invest in energy transition technology. The Japanese firm is building plants to produce alkaline water electrolyzer cell frames and membranes in Kawasaki, Japan. Both facilities will have 2 GW of capacity for each of those products. Their total cost is about $240 million, a third of which will be paid for by the Japanese government. In Kurashiki, Japan, Asahi is testing a biogas purification system at a sewage treatment plant. The setup uses a zeolite catalyst to separate carbon dioxide from methane. In a setback for Asahi, it has elected to wind down production of methyl methacrylate, styrene-butadiene latex, acetonitrile, and other products in Kawasaki. The products generate about $230 million in annual sales for the company.

47. BOREALIS
2024 chemical sales: $8.5 billion

Thanks to a more than 10% increase in sales in 2024, the Austria-based petrochemical producer Borealis returns to the Global Top 50 after falling off it last year. And much change is afoot. Borealis's parent companies, the refiner OMV and Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC), are combining their chemical holdings into a single company. As a result, Borealis, Canada's Nova Chemicals, and Abu Dhabi–based Borouge will combine to form Borouge Group International. According to 2024 sales, the firm will have annual revenues of about $18 billion—enough to have landed it in the top 20 this year had it been formed last year. Borouge Group will also be the fourth-largest polyolefin maker in the world; OMV and ADNOC will each own 47% of the firm.

48. WESTLAKE
2024 chemical sales: $8.3 billion

Westlake returns to the ranking after a 1-year absence. The US vinyl and petrochemical maker has a new CEO, Jean-Marc Gilson, who replaced Albert Chao, a member of Westlake's founding family. Gilson ran another Global Top 50 firm, Mitsubishi Chemical Group, for 3 years, and he is instituting changes. For example, Westlake is shutting down bisphenol A and liquid epoxy capacity in Pernis, the Netherlands. The company has a venture capital arm, Westlake Innovations, that in December invested in Ontario-based Universal Matter, which converts carbon waste into graphene.

49. PTT GLOBAL CHEMICAL
2024 chemical sales: $8.1 billion

The Thai petrochemical producer returns to the Global Top 50 after dropping off last year. PTT Global Chemical has been working on ambitious projects in both its core petrochemical business and biobased materials. In March, it signed a deal to start buying ethane from the US firm Enterprise Products Partners in 2029. PTT will be the first Thai ethylene maker to import the low-cost chemical raw material from the US. In biobased chemicals, NatureWorks, a polylactic acid joint venture between PTT and Cargill, expects to open a plant in Thailand in 2026. PTT is also expanding its biorefining operations.

50. SASOL
2024 chemical sales: $8.0 billion

The South African chemical company has gotten caught up in Europe's crisis of high petrochemical production costs and weak demand. Sasol plans to close a plant in Italy that makes linear alkyl benzene, used to make detergents, by October. The company earlier decided to shutter a German alkylphenol plant. Additionally, Sasol will close two phenolic chemical plants in Texas by year-end.