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ABOUT US

U. S. Amines manufactures and distributes a variety of alkyl and allyl amines. We currently have three world-scale production facilities.  The plants are located in Bucks, Alabama and Portsmouth, Virginia in the USA and African Amines located in Newcastle, South Africa.  See the African Amines link for more information.  The quality of our products are unsurpassed in the industry.  Alkylamines and allylamines are used as basic materials, predominantly in agro chemicals but also in rubber processing, water treatment chemicals, pharmaceuticals and others.

Safety and Environmental Commitment
At U. S. Amines, we are committed to operating our facilities safely and in an environmentally friendly manner. This includes active employee safety, process safety, training, and environmental programs. We encourage all employees to identify and eliminate hazards in our Hazard Recognition Process. By eliminating unsafe acts and hazards through hazard recognition, safety performance is enhanced. This is a proactive program to eliminate injuries before they happen. We are also committed to operate our plants in an environmentally friendly manner and maintain compliance with all of our environmental permits. We are active in our
local Community Advisor Panels, Industry Panels, and Environmental Organizations.

Portsmouth Boatyard

The Portsmouth ship yard.
A popular tourist attraction not far from the U. S. Amines plant.
A HISTORY OF US AMINES
Our Roots:
The roots of US Amines were established near our plant in Portsmouth, Virginia. In 1899, William Ellery Channing Eustis established Eustis Smelting Works in West Norfolk, Virginia. The company was a copper smelting operation and William Eustis was known as the “Copper King”. Eustis had offices in Boston and copper mines and smelting operations in Quebec and Vermont. The Virginia plant was supplied with copper ore, shipped in family-owned boats around Cape Horn of South America, from Chile. In 1909, Eustis incorporated the business and named it Virginia Smelting Company. One of the by-products of copper smelting was sulfur dioxide and sulfuric acid. In the 1920's, Eustis pioneered and developed a process to make dry sulfur dioxide and methyl chloride which became the refrigerants of choice for domestic refrigerators. Methyl chloride was synthesized by boiling a mixture of methanol, sulfuric acid, and sodium chloride. In 1928, DuPont developed a less hazardous refrigerant called Freon. Virginia Smelting Company became the sole packager and national distributor for DuPont Freon.
Virginia Chemicals, Inc.:
In 1961 Virginia Smelting Company changed its name to Virginia Chemicals and Smelting Company. In March 1965 the name was changed to Virginia Chemicals, Inc. At this time Virginia Chemicals was a major manufacturer and national distributor of many air conditioning and refrigeration related products. These products included DuPont Freon, Suniso refrigeration oils, solvents, and water chemicals. Their Can-O-Gas and the Can-O-Gas Valve were developed to ease the task of refrigerant charging automotive air conditioning. This basic refrigerant can and valve design is still in use today.



VA Smelting ad
Can o gas valve

Sunisio oil
Portsmouth Amines:
In 1964, Virginia Chemicals built its first amines plant in Portsmouth. The plant manufactured cyclohexylamine, ethylamines, and butylamines. The plant was expanded in the late 1960’s and early 1970’s. A liquid phase plant was added in 1979 and the current No. 4 Amines Plant was added on 1981. The other plants were subsequently closed.

Bucks Plant:
In 1970, Virginia Chemicals built a sodium bisulfate plant in Bucks, Alabama. In 1972, expanding on its sulfur chemicals business it built a sodium hydrosulfite plant using technology acquired from Mitsubishi Chemicals of Japan. In 1978, it began production of sulfur dioxide.

Bucks Amines:
In 1975, a multi-purpose, vapor-phase Amines plant was added to the site. The amines business was expanded in 1982 with the addition of a liquid-phase amines plant. The vapor phase plant can produce a variety of alkyl amines with carbon radicals of C2 to C9. The liquid phase plant is actually a hydrogenation reaction plant that has the capability of producing a variety of amines and conducting other hydrogenation reactions.

Celanese Corporation:
January 19, 1981 Virginia Chemicals, Inc. was purchased by Celanese Corporation. The company was held as a wholly-owned subsidiary and the company name was changed to Virginia Chemicals, A Celanese Company. In 1984, Celanese sold the air conditioning and refrigeration division of Virginia Chemicals, headquartered in Dallas, Texas to Lai Berg Holdings. That business became Virginia KMP Corporation. KMP operated independently for many years but was ultimately dissolved into Parker Hannifin Corporation in 2005.

More Bucks History:
In 1982, a 10/90 joint venture was established at the Bucks plant with UCB of Belgium for the manufacture of tetramethylthiuramdisulfide (TMTD). The product was a fungicide and rubber tire manufacturing chemical. The plant was closed in 1987. UCB held the 90%.
In 1985, a partnership was established with Mitsubishi Chemical Industries at the Bucks plant for the manufacture of isobutlyidenediurea (IBDU). The product was a slow release specialty nitrogen fertilizer for golf courses and garden nurseries. The company IB Nitrogen was a 50/50 joint venture between Celanese and Mitsubishi. The partners sold the plant to NuGro in 1998 which was subsequently acquired by Agrium of Canada. The IB Nitrogen plant was operated by Celanese and later US Amines. The plant was closed in 2009.

Hoechst Celanese Corporation:
In 1987, Celanese was acquired by Hoechst AG of West Germany and merged with American Hoechst, to establish Hoechst Celanese Corporation. The company name Virginia Chemicals was dropped at that time. Hoechst Celanese later sold the Bucks plant sulfur chemicals business to Clariant in 1997. Those plants were closed by Clariant in June 2001.

Celanese Corporation and Celanese AG:
In 1998, Hoechst Celanese demerged their chemicals business. The new company was called Celanese AG and the division in the USA was called Celanese Corporation. The Bucks plant and the Portsmouth plant ended up as part Celanese Corporation. The Portsmouth plant spent the first year of the new Celanese under the ownership of Clariant which had purchased the Portsmouth site. The Portsmouth amines plant was bought back by Celanese in 1999.

U S Amines:
In January 2003, US Amines acquired the Bucks and Portsmouth amines plants from Celanese. The largest portion of the original Portsmouth site was retained by Clariant and subsequently sold to BASF. The BASF facilities at Portsmouth have been closed. US Amines owns about 7 acres of the original 50+ acres owned by Virginia Chemicals in Portmouth. US Amines acquired all of the property at Bucks and subsequently some of the Clariant assets that remained on the Bucks site. US Amines established its headquarters at the Bucks, Alabama site.

African Amines:

In 2008, US Amines Limited acquired African Amines (PTY) Limited from Sasol Chemical Industries and Air Products South Africa (Pty) Limited. African Amines opened in November 1994 as a 50:50 joint venture between Sasol and Dow-Sentrachem. The plant is located in an industrial park in Newcastle, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. Products include methylamine, dimethylamine, ethylamine, and isopropylamine.

Current:
U. S. Amines Limited is currently comprised of three wholly-owned companies: U. S. Amines (Bucks) LLC, U. S. Amines (Portsmouth) LLC, and African Amines (PTY) Limited. I hope you have enjoyed this walk through our company history that goes back over one hundred years.

   
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