IIR's 2025 North American Outlook Reveals Market Trends in Chemical Processing, Other Industrial Markets

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Written by Paul Wiseman for Industrial Info Resources (Sugar Land, Texas)--In the Chemical Processing Industry alone, Industrial Info was tracking $86 billion in chemical projects planned to begin construction during 2024, of which a majority were "green" or "blue" in the U.S. and Canada, said Trey Hamblet, senior vice president of research operations for Industrial Info. Hamblet led off Industrial Info's 2025 North American Outlook presentation in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, on October 24. Green defines projects that are considered to have no greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions at all, while blue includes those that emit GHGs that are remediated by carbon capture and storage (CCS).

Using Industrial Info's Project Realization tool, Hamblet showed that the $86 billion is how January 2024 began. That number was almost three times the number starting 2023 (just under $29 billion), meaning "We started this year with this just incredible momentum, and a lot of that was developmental delays, projects that have just been continually pushed to the right."

Click on the image at right to view chemical processing realization for 2024.

Green and blue projects include hydrogen, methanol, ammonia, ethylene and recycled plastics.

Industrial Info has been tracking some of the projects for more than a decade, Hamblet said, and despite delays, the planners "are not giving up, because of all the incentives and other things that are driving it." Among those drivers are global greenhouse mandates, government incentives, investor environmental, social and governance (ESG) strategies and consumer sentiment.

Hamblet has seen consumer sentiment up close. He recalled an Uber ride recently where the driver told of taking his electric vehicle to a charging station a mile away from his home--something that requires a significant amount of dedication to ESG principles, he noted.

Many blue and green projects are being delayed for several reasons. Many of the tax incentives are complex and difficult to fulfill, renewable power supplies are expensive and not always available, power storage and distribution networks are still being developed, and, especially in an election year, those policies could change, obviating previous investments.

Those constraints will become more apparent after the election. "While we will have an election outcome very soon, we really don't know what the outcome or impact on the market will be until next year, which policies get extended, which ones get trimmed, which ones will continue to push momentum in the industry."

Still, Industrial Info expects about $24 billion of those projects to be underway by the end of this year, with about $18 billion that appear especially promising. The rest, as stated, have mostly just been delayed, not abandoned.

2025 Outlook
Industrial Info sees about $86.5 billion in overall spending for chemical processing in 2025, with the majority--$61.1 billion--set aside for ESG projects. The sectors with the greatest percentage of ESG spending are plastics and resins, petrochemicals, industrial gases (almost 100% of spend in this category, $26.0 billion of a $27.4 billion total) and agricultural chemicals ($21.4 billion of $25.5 billion total).

Click on the image at right to view chemical processing 2025 potential spending by sector.

Hamblet explained that those numbers included only projects with high and medium probabilities of moving forward in 2025.

Weather and Chemicals
Gulf Coast plant output can be affected by extreme weather, which Industrial Info carefully tracks. This year, hurricanes Beryl, Helene and Milton have cruised through the region causing extensive damage, especially in Florida. But, said Hamblet, fewer than 50 chemical plants were impacted--at least so far.

The Conference
This kind of tracking was just one of seven presentations at the Baton Rouge conference. Other topics included: petroleum refining and alternative fuels; upstream and midstream oil and gas markets; electric power; metals and minerals; food, beverage, and paper; and the overall U. S. spending forecast for 2025.

Attendee Appreciation
"This type of information is amazing--I didn't know you could get this amount of information in this short amount of time," said attendee Shannon Cloud of Hargrove EPC. "It was like drinking from a fire hydrant!"

Hargrove said he had heard about Industrial Info at a presentation at the Port Arthur Chamber of Commerce three weeks earlier, and they had suggested he come to Baton Rouge to learn more.

Up Next
Future stories will cover additional presentations including alternative fuels, petroleum refining and others.

Industrial Info Resources (IIR) is the leading provider of industrial market intelligence. Since 1983, IIR has provided comprehensive research, news and analysis on the industrial process, manufacturing and energy related industries. IIR's Global Market Intelligence (GMI) platform helps companies identify and pursue trends across multiple markets with access to real, qualified and validated plant and project opportunities. Across the world, IIR is tracking more than 200,000 current and future projects worth $17.8 trillion (USD).