Within the last year, the market has had more shortages than I’ve come across in my thirty years experience. In the past I have seen sharp price increases, and I have seen several shortages, and delivery issues stemming from resin allocations from resin companies. This is actually the first time I have seen all these issues at the same time.
Polytetraflouroethylene (TFE) and Kynar – PVDF are both on allocation.
This pair of resins are in short supply. The PTFE Sheet product PTFE (TFE) as well as PVDF manufacturing requires a mineral called Fluorspar which is mined in Mongolia and China. The world requirement for this mineral has increased significantly, as well as the supply has tightened. PTFE materials have high temperature resistance, excellent chemical resistance and incredibly low co-efficient of friction (slippery) and is utilised in dozens of applications from non-stick fry pans to ptfe tape for home use. This particular mineral is actually a important raw material inside the production of fluoropolymers, fluorolubricants and quite a few refrigerants.This increasing amount of demand joined together with general shortage of raw materials has caused a dramatic price increase (almost double over the last year), shortages, and we expect these two factors to stay in affect in the near future.