Total Petrochemicals USA Inc. is a subsidiary of

Total SA TotalEnergies SE is a French multinational integrated energy and petroleum company founded in 1924 and one of the seven supermajor oil companies. Its businesses cover the entire oil and gas chain, from crude oil and natural gas exploration and ...

. It engages in the production and marketing of petrochemical products. Its headquarters is the

Total Plaza Total Plaza (formerly the Entex Building, Louisiana Place, and United Gas Building) is a tower in Downtown Houston, Texas, one block from the Allen Center complex. The building, managed by Brookfield Properties, opened in 1971. The 35-story build ...

Downtown ''Downtown'' is a term primarily used in North America by English speakers to refer to a city's sometimes commercial, cultural and often the historical, political and geographic heart. It is often synonymous with its central business distric ...

Houston Houston (; ) is the most populous city in Texas, the most populous city in the Southern United States, the fourth-most populous city in the United States, and the sixth-most populous city in North America, with a population of 2,304,580 in ...

Texas Texas (, ; Spanish language, Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2 ...

History

The company was incorporated in 1956 as American Petrofina Inc. It had $10 million capitalization and headquarters in

Dallas Dallas () is the List of municipalities in Texas, third largest city in Texas and the largest city in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, the List of metropolitan statistical areas, fourth-largest metropolitan area in the United States at 7.5 ...

. Belgian parent company

Petrofina Petrofina was a Belgian oil company. It merged with Total in 1999 to form TotalFina, which after subsequent mergers has changed its name back to Total. In the United States, Fina's former refining and marketing operations are now owned by De ...

owned the majority of American Petrofina's stock—but an American, Harry A. Jackson Jr., served as its first president. It purchased the small petroleum companies Panhandle Oil Co. in 1956 and the American Liberty Co. of Dallas in 1957, in order to begin actual operations In June 2000, Fina Oil & Chemical Co. was renamed Atofina Petrochemicals Inc. and the headquarters moved to Houston Texas. In 1963, the company acquired Cogsden Petroleum Corp. In 1968, it acquired Gulf Oil's

Calumet City, Illinois Calumet City ( ) is a city in Cook County, Illinois, Cook County, Illinois, United States. The population was 36,033 at the 2020 census, a decline of 2.7% from 37,042 in 2010. The ZIP code is 60409. Etymology The word ''Calumet'' is the Miꞌkmaq ...

facilities, to build a

polystyrene Polystyrene (PS) is a synthetic polymer made from monomers of the aromatic hydrocarbon styrene. Polystyrene can be solid or foamed. General-purpose polystyrene is clear, hard, and brittle. It is an inexpensive resin per unit weight. It is a ...

plant. In 1973, Atofina acquired the

Port Arthur Refinery The Motiva refinery is an oil refinery located in Port Arthur, Texas. It is the largest oil refinery in North America. The first processing units of the Port Arthur Refinery were constructed in 1902 by the Texas Company, later Texaco. The root ...

from BP. In 1977, the company acquired polystyrene plants in

Orange, California Orange is a city located in North Orange County, California. It is approximately north of the county seat, Santa Ana, California, Santa Ana. Orange is unusual in this region because many of the homes in its Old Town District were built before ...

and

Windsor, New Jersey Windsor is a small historic unincorporated community located within Robbinsville Township (known as Washington Township until 2007) in Mercer County, New Jersey, United States. The area is served as United States Postal Service ZIP Code 08561. ...

. In 1984, it acquired

ARCO ARCO ( ) is a brand of gasoline stations currently owned by Marathon Petroleum after BP sold its rights. BP commercializes the brand in Northern California, Oregon and Washington, while Marathon has rights for the rest of the United States an ...

's polypropylene plant in

La Porte, Texas La Porte ( ) is a city in Harris County, Texas, United States, within the Bay Area of the Houston–Sugar Land–Baytown metropolitan area. As of the 2020 census, the city population was 35,124. La Porte is the fourth-largest incorporated c ...

. In 1985, the company changed the name of American Petrofina Co. of Texas, a wholly owned subsidiary of American Petrofina Inc., to Fina Oil and Chemical Co. In 1991, that name was changed to FINA Inc. The La Porte Plant was expanded in 1995, becoming the largest single-site polypropylene plant in the world. In 1996, the other plant owned by FINA, the Carville Polystyrene Plant, took this position after its expansion. In 1997 FINA formed a joint venture with BASF to build world's largest naphtha steam cracker facility, opened in 2001. In 1998, FINA was merged with its parent company of Petrofina SA, then Petrofina merged with

Total S.A. TotalEnergies SE is a French multinational integrated energy and petroleum company founded in 1924 and one of the seven supermajor oil companies. Its businesses cover the entire oil and gas chain, from crude oil and natural gas exploration and ...

in 1999. After the acquisition of Elf Acquitaine, the chemicals division of the company was named ATOFINA Petrochemicals Inc. On 1 October 2004, the name was changed to Total Petrochemicals USA, Inc.Dawson, Jennifer.
ATOFINA to move from Greenspoint to downtown
" ''

Houston Business Journal American City Business Journals, Inc. (ACBJ) is an American newspaper publisher based in Charlotte, North Carolina. ACBJ publishes The Business Journals, which contains local business news for 44 markets in the United States, Hemmings Motor News ...

''. Monday July 19, 2004. Retrieved on April 5, 2010.

Operations

The firm now employs more than 7000 employees, and has sales of $3.4 billion. It trades on the AMEX Stock Exchange.

Headquarters

The Total Petrochemicals USA headquarters is the

.Corporate: Driving Directions
" Total Petrochemicals USA. Retrieved on April 5, 2010. In early 2005, Total Petrochemicals USA signed a lease to occupy space in the Louisiana Place.LOUISIANA PLACE, 1201 LOUISIANA, RENAMED TOTAL PLAZA
" McDaniel & Co. Wednesday March 8, 2006. Retrieved on April 5, 2010. In late 2005, Total Petrochemicals USA moved hundreds of employees into the building, whose name was changed from Louisiana Plaza to Total Plaza.Dawson, Jennifer.

" ''

''. Thursday June 22, 2006. Retrieved on April 5, 2010. The company signed a 15 year lease for of space and had scheduled to relocate 250 employees by November 2005. It had an option for an additional of space in the Total Plaza. The space that Total Petrochemicals USA moved into was previously occupied by the

Metropolitan Transit Authority of Harris County, Texas The Metropolitan Transit Authority of Harris County (stylized as METRO) is a major public transportation agency based in Houston, Texas, United States. It operates bus, light rail, bus rapid transit, HOV and HOT lanes, and paratransit service (u ...

(METRO), which planned to move into a new administration building in January 2005. At one time, Atofina's headquarters were in an area in Houston close to

George Bush Intercontinental Airport George Bush Intercontinental Airport is an international airport in Houston, Texas, United States, serving the Greater Houston metropolitan area. Located about north of Downtown Houston between Interstate 45 and Interstate 69/U.S. Highway 59 ...

and near to the North Houston district.Boundary Map
" North Houston Management District. Retrieved on May 19, 2009. The lease to the former space was scheduled to expire in 2010, but the company had the right to cancel its lease in 2007. The firm, which occupied a similar amount of square footage in the previous office that it has in its current office, planned to sublease the space from 2005 to 2007.

References

External links

Company website

Fina Oil & Chemical Co. renamed Atofina Petrochemicals, Inc.

{{DEFAULTSORT:Total Petrochemicals Usa Chemical companies of the United States Oil companies of the United States TotalEnergies Petrochemical companies Companies based in Houston American subsidiaries of foreign companies 1956 establishments in Texas