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The Itupeva plant in Brazil is located near the city of São Paulo (an hour's drive). Its operations started in 1986, with the Nitrogen Derivatives unit (presently Surfactants) comprising the nitrile, batch hydrogenation, amine distillation and quaternization process units. It was, and still is, one of a few Brazilian companies to have installed its own incinerator to dispose of its liquid and gas wastes.
Later on, new processing units were installed at the site: OBPA plant (now Functional Chemicals); Liquid Peroxides plant (now Polymer Chemicals); Crystex® (new Flexsys) and Solid Peroxides (Polymer Chemicals).
Recently an investment of $2 million was made to upgrade the site's common waste water treatment unit.
The site has an integrated Quality, Safety and Environmental Management System, which is ISO 9001:2001 / ISO 14001 / OHSAS 18001 certified. It is also a signatory of Responsible Care, being the first Brazilian site to be verified by third parties. Other safety programs implemented at the site include MTS (Managing Total Safety) and BBS (Behavior Based Safety). Several social programs are carried out in the surrounding community.
Since 1996, Surfactants Itupeva has received the Supplier Quality Award annually. And in 2001, it received the Innovation Quality award from Unilever.
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