Basic Chemical Manufacturers NAICS 3251

Mar 20, 2025 - EPA to Speed Permitting

• Chemical manufacturers and refiners could see the permitting process for new chemicals accelerate under action taken by the EPA to repeal a Biden-era amendment to the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA), Chemical Processing reports. As part of the Trump administration’s sweeping deregulation efforts, the EPA under its new administrator Lee Zeldin has announced plans to reconsider the regulation governing the review of chemicals already in commerce. Also, an amendment to the TSCA, which placed stricter requirements on the new chemicals review process, has come under fire by the industry and republican lawmakers who say places unnecessary burdens on chemical manufacturers and refiners by slowing the permitting process and inhibiting the availability of chemicals. The EPA’s action to streamline chemical reviews came just days after the agency issued new guidance directing that any spending exceeding $50,000 requires approval from the Elon Musk-led Department of Government Efficiency.
• Dragged down by the weak industrial and construction sectors – major consumers of basic chemicals – in 2024, the American Chemistry Council (ACC) is predicting a better year for chemicals in 2025. The trade group estimates that US chemical output, excluding pharmaceuticals, declined by 0.4% in 2024, but expects growth to resume at a 1.9% rate this year. That’s compared to a predicted 0.4% decline in output last year, on the heels of a 0.2% decline in 2023. “The industrial sector, which of course is where chemicals play, remains pretty stagnant,” the ACC’s chief economist, Martha Moore, said in December. An exception has been the electronic materials sector, where business is booming because of construction of data centers and semiconductor fabrication plants. The ACC forecasts that sales of chemicals used in electronics will grow 8% this year. While the council expects lower interest rates to spur more spending in major chemical-consuming sectors, tariffs remain a wildcard.

• Chemical production increased in 2024 versus a year ago and is expected to continue to rise in 2025 as the destocking cycle that plagued the industry in 2023 eases and demand rises across most products, according to the American Chemistry Council’s (ACC) mid-year outlook report. To support further revenue growth, chemical manufacturers have announced cost-reduction measures and are increasing margins while continuing to invest in decarbonization and innovation, according to a November Deloitte Research Center for Energy & Industrials report. The chemical industry is expected to see moderate growth in 2025, with the ACC projecting global chemical production to rise by 3.4% in 2024 and 3.5% in 2025, after increasing just 0.3% in 2023. Challenges ahead for chemical manufacturers as they position themselves to compete in the low-carbon, high-tech future include shifts in policy and regulations under a new US administration, changing customer preferences, and technological advances.
• Employment by basic chemical manufacturers grew by 1.4% in January compared to a year ago, while the average industry wage rose 4.1% over the same period to $39.83 per hour, according to the latest US Bureau of Labor Statistics data. Low demand and industry destocking continued to depress chemical manufacturers’ pricing power in December with producer prices dipping 0.9% year over year after declining 9.5% in the previous December-versus-December annual comparison, BLS data show. Sales for the US basic chemical manufacturers industry are forecast to grow at a 2.63% compounded annual rate from 2025 to 2029, slower than the growth of the overall economy, according to the latest forecast for the Interindustry Economic Research Fund, Inc.