Toray Industries (Tokyo / Japan; www.toray.com) and its Paris / France-based subsidiary Toray Carbon Fibers Europe (CFE) have completed the construction of a carbon fibre precursor plant at CFE’s Lacq / France facility. The plant is part of Toray Group’s investment plan announced in March 2012 to expand carbon fibre production capacity at its four global production sites in Japan, the US, France and South Korea – see Plasteurope.com of 20.03.2012.

The French unit is the company’s third precursor production base with facilities already built in Japan and the US. Toray said the plant will enable CFE to move on to integrated production, switching to precursor produced at its own plant rather than from material produced in Japan, thereby boosting cost competitiveness. CFE will also supply various Toray Group production bases including Toray Advanced Material Korea, contributing to the group-wide business expansion.

The worldwide demand for PAN-based carbon fibres expanded to over 40,000 t in 2013 and is expected to continue to grow at a rate exceeding 15% a year, the company said. In addition to producing high performance regular tow carbon fibre “Torayca”, Toray acquired Zoltek Companies (Bridgeton, Missouri / USA), a large tow carbon fibre business, in 2013 – see Plasteurope.com of 30.09.2013.