Commercial production is by alkylation of anhydrous ammonia with methanol.
The company is debottlenecking amines facilities at Pensacola and St. Gabriel, La., and building a new stand-alone methylamines unit at Pensacola. The new methylamines plant is expected on stream by mid-1998 and will raise capacity to 400 million pounds. DuPont plans further debottlenecking this year. More stringent water quality standards and strong derivatives exports are the primary driving forces for expansions. A downturn in derivatives exports would be felt quickly in methylamines.