Domo Caproleuna, a subsidiary of fully integrated polyamide 6 producer Domo Chemicals, has now delivered five million tons of caprolactam raw material from its Leuna site in Germany – equivalent to approximately 225,000 truckloads.

Domo Caproleuna has been producing caprolactam and polyamide at the site since 1994 and during this period, production capacities have been gradually expanded to the current 176,000 metric tons per year.

Caprolactam production has an 80-year-old tradition at the Leuna site and the world’s first industrial-scale caprolactam production plant went into operation there in 1942. Since the Domo Group took over the caprolactam plant in 1994, technology and processes have been continuously enhanced and improved. Over the past 20 years, Domo Caproleuna has been able to reduce specific energy consumption in medium-pressure steam by 30% and in low-pressure steam by 40%, continuously optimising the manufacturing process.

Domo Chemicals is committing to neutral CO2 emissions growth by 2030, and from 2019, establishing a 15% reduction in the carbon content of its  energy mix and a 7% reduction of industrial waste.

“Over the last three decades, we have continued to expand the caprolactam plant and have increased production volumes extensively,” said production manager Thomas Jende. “Today’s focus is clearly on increasing efficiency and saving energy.”

Caprolactam is primarily required to produce polyamide 6 and is further processed in the company’s own polymerization facility, which is integrated on-site, to produce  high-tech engineering plastics under the brand names Domamid and Technyl. Domamid is primarily used as a base polymer for engineering plastics, textiles and film applications. Technyl is the leading polyamide-based compound for a variety of industry segments such as automotive, electronics and consumer goods.

“The success is a team effort,” said Leuna site director Luc de Raedt. “This excellence in operation and production is only possible because the corresponding production volumes were also achieved in the upstream and downstream process stages of the value chain.”

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