Paulínia is a Brazilian municipality in the interior of the state of São Paulo. It is located in the northwest of the São Paulo Macrometropolis and is about 119&nbsp;km from the state capital. It occupies an area of 139&nbsp;km<sup>2</sup> and in 2022 Census, IBGE estimated its population at 110,537. Thanks to Replan and the petrochemical pole, which are based in the northern part of the city, Paulínia has the seventh highest per capita income in Brazil. Also due to the pole, the city presents high levels of ozone pollution, mainly in the district of Betel and in the Replan region, where companies such as Rhodia, Purina, Shell, Syngenta, and Petrobras are located. Paulínia stands out for its intense population growth, the largest in the Metropolitan Region of Campinas. Historically, the service sector has not been very important for the municipality, but recently it has been developing because of projects like Paulínia Magia do Cinema (English: Paulínia Magic of Cinema).

Since 2019, Paulínia has had a new source of income and employment for the city and the Metropolitan Region of Campinas. The technology sector has been growing in Paulínia with the arrival of ASCENTY, a multinational company specialized in the field of "Data Centers", with data processing centers and branches in Brazil, Chile, Mexico and Colombia, thus opening the door for the arrival of two other companies in the city, CloudHQ and Amazon.

The municipality is formed by the city of Paulínia and the district of Betel, in the eastern region. Paulínia is part of the so-called Extended Metropolitan Complex, which exceeds 29 million inhabitants, approximately 75% of the population of the entire state of São Paulo. The metropolitan regions of Campinas and São Paulo already form the first megalopolis in the southern hemisphere, uniting 65 municipalities that together are home to 12% of the Brazilian population.

Etymology

left|thumb|José Paulino Nogueira, from whom the name Paulínia derived.

The term Paulínia pays homage to José Paulino Nogueira, a farmer from Campineiro, one of the owners of Funil farm, located between the present-day cities of Paulínia and Cosmópolis. The village that gave rise to the city of Paulínia was called José Paulino Village until 1944, when a state decree prohibited localities from having names of living people. Due to this fact, the village was elevated to a district with the name "Paulínia".

José Paulino was born on 13 February 1853, in Campinas. At the end of the Empire, as a member of the Republican Party of São Paulo, he was elected an alderman in his hometown, alongside Júlio de Mesquita and Salvador Penteado. In March 1889, when there was an outbreak of yellow fever in Campinas, José Paulino was one of the few authorities who did not abandon the city; he fought the disease and became loved by the people of Campinas.

Origins

During the 18th century, the region of Campinas began to be occupied due to the passage of the bandeirantes routes that headed for the gold mines in the interior of Brazil. The settlement began more precisely in the period between 1739 and 1744, when Captain Francisco Barreto Leme do Prado arrived at the then parish of Nossa Senhora de Conceição de Campinas.

The history of Paulínia as an urban agglomeration begins with the donation of sesmarias by the Portuguese government. There are reports of the donation of two large sesmarias in the region of the Atibaia and Jaguari rivers, where the city of Paulínia is located today, one in 1796 and another, called the Morro Azul sesmaria, in 1807. From the latter originated the São Bento farm, acquired by Comendador Francisco de Paula Camargo, and the Funil farm; both have a great connection with the establishment of Paulínia.

Paulínia's population was formed mainly by Italian immigrants, who replaced the slaves that worked on the farms after the abolition of slavery in 1888. However, with the economic growth, the city has become a destination for many immigrants from neighboring cities and other parts of Brazil, especially from the Northeast, who are looking for work or better living conditions.

From village to district

left|thumb|Workers from the surrounding farms cleared the way for the railroad.

The first urban center in the region of Paulínia was a village called São Bento where, in 1903, a chapel was inaugurated in honor of the same saint, which had begun to be built in 1897, the same year in which the plans and budget for the José Paulino station were approved. Around this chapel the São Bento neighborhood began to develop. At this time São Bento was a suburb of Campinas.

The inauguration of the carriage section of the Funilense Railroad, on 18 September 1899, changed the economic order of the São Bento neighborhood. The José Paulino Station attracted many merchants to the neighborhood and gave rise to José Paulino Village, the result of the development of the São Bento neighborhood. Around the station there was Comércio Street, later renamed José Paulino Avenue, and a replica of the chapel of the São Bento farm, the São Bento Church, which still exists today. On 30 November 1944, through Decree-Law 14334, José Paulino was elevated to a district with the name Paulínia. creating the town of Paulínia. The refinery transformed Paulínia into a population attraction center, growing from 6,900 inhabitants in 1972 to 28,620 in 1973, tripling the number of inhabitants.

Economic Growth

thumb|President [[Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva with workers at the inauguration of REPLAN's Propene Unit, in 2009.]]

The first industrial unit to be installed where Paulínia is today was Rhodia, in 1942. For years it was the main industry in the city, initially focused on agro-industrial production and later transformed into a chemical industry. Industries in Paulínia are concentrated in two distinct points: the REPLAN region and the district of Betel, which are consequently the richest and most polluted areas in Paulínia. It started operating in 2008, with initial capacity to produce 300 thousand tons per year of polypropylene, and potential to reach 350 thousand tons per year.

In late 2010, LG announced that it would build an industrial plant in the city of Paulínia, on land donated by the city government, which would produce white goods such as refrigerators, stoves, microwave ovens, among others. Construction was scheduled to begin in March 2011, with completion in October of the same year. The factory would employ 4.000 employees, surpassing Petrobras and becoming Paulínia's largest employer. However, by October, the construction work had not begun, causing the councilors to question the city hall. The initial project foresaw a three-story building, more suitable to the irregularity of the terrain. However, LG's headquarters requested a change to a single floor, which would have required the company to spend R$30 million on earthmoving. LG then asked the city to exchange the donated land, which was refused because there was no other land with the same measurements. After this refusal, the company asked the city to pay for the earthmoving, which was also rejected, because Mayor José Pavan Júnior considered that the administration had already spent too much on the project (the donated land was valued at at least R$100 million). Since then the contacts between the company and the city hall have decreased. The donated area will return to the city hall if construction does not begin by the end of 2015.

Recent History

left|thumb|Central Betel region, annexed in 1993.

Paulínia's recent history is marked by great economic development, urban and population growth. Since the 1980s, when the municipal hospital was inaugurated, many works have been carried out to increase the capacity of some services. In 1981, the mayor of Paulínia at the time, Geraldo José Ballone, sent a law bill to the city council that created the municipal hospital. At the time the city had about 20,753 inhabitants, but the population did not have a public health facility in town that could provide examinations and consultations.

In the 1990s, great works were carried out in Paulínia, among them the construction of a virtual library, where citizens have free access to the internet, Paulínia's sambodrome, which is the largest indoor sambodrome in the country, and the improvement of the city's road systems.

The intense urban growth of Paulínia and neighboring cities provoked the conurbation effect. This phenomenon is stronger on the border of Paulínia with Sumaré, between the districts of Bom Retiro (Paulínia) and Maria Antônia (Sumaré), and on the border with Campinas, between the districts of Betel and Barão Geraldo. Paulínia has relevant territorial growth. In 1993 it annexed the Betel district, in Campinas, through a plebiscite. Neighborhoods and regions such as Granja Coavi, Parque dos Jequitibás and parts of the neighborhoods São José, João Aranha and Marieta Dian, which are in Cosmópolis and Americana also tend to be annexed by Paulínia.

Geography

thumb|Panoramic view of Paulínia.

Paulínia's geography is homogeneous. The municipality has a flat relief and Atlantic vegetation. The area of the municipality is 141.72&nbsp;km<sup>2</sup>, representing 0.0509% of the São Paulo territory, 0.0353% of the area of the Southeast region of Brazil, and 0.0017% of the whole Brazilian territory. It is located in the central-eastern region of the state of São Paulo, between the Atibaia and Jaguari rivers and the Quilombo and Anhumas creeks, 118 kilometers from São Paulo by asphalt road, and 98 kilometers as the crow flies. Located in the Peripheral Paulista Depression, in São Paulo, the city borders Cosmópolis (to the north), Campinas (to the southeast), Sumaré (to the south), Nova Odessa (to the southwest), Jaguariúna (to the east), Holambra (to the northeast) and Americana (to the west). The urban perimeter of Paulínia is 137.61&nbsp;km<sup>2</sup>, which is equivalent to 99% of the total area.

Relief and geology

left|thumb|View of the Marieta Dian neighborhood, one of the city's high points.

Paulínia is located in the so-called Peripheral Paulista Depression, a formation between the western and Atlantic plateaus (Serra do Mar and Serra da Mantiqueira). The territory is homogeneous, with great relief variations only in the neighborhoods of Alto de Pinheiros, Vila Nunes, Marieta Dian, Santa Cecília and Tereza Zorzetto Vedovello. The highest neighborhoods in Paulínia are located in the northern and eastern regions of the city, such as Marieta Dian, São José and Parque das Indústrias.

Paulínia's soil is also homogeneous, being of good quality in most of the city. It is characteristic for having a lot of humus, which facilitates the development of crops.

The lowest altitudes of the Paulista Peripheral Depression are located in the region of the Atibaia and Jaguari rivers, between 560 and 600 meters above sea level. In this region the morphology is characterized by broad hills with flattened tops. This zone also has its greatest thicknesses, with the presence of fluvial facies typical of floodplains. Near Paulínia, they reach a thickness of about 10 meters. The diabase rocks are abundant between Paulínia and Campinas, and are fine to medium grained.

Besides these rivers, several streams and creeks are present in Paulínia, especially the Quilombo creek, on the border with Sumaré, and the Anhumas creek, on the border with Campinas and Jaguariúna. Among the streams are Jacaré and Jacarezinho, which are tributaries of Jaguari, Areião, Veadinho, and São Bento, tributaries of the Atibaia River, and the streams Betel, Fazenda do Deserto and Velosa (the latter on the border with Sumaré), tributaries of Quilombo Creek. The municipality also has several lakes and lagoons, the main ones being Santa Terezinha, Armando Ferreira, Jardim Botânico, José Maria Malavazzi and César Bierrembach. with rains concentrated in the summer months, with a decrease in its frequency in the winter, when the relative humidity of the air drops, especially during the afternoon, with rates below 30% or even close to 20%. Due to the low concentration of buildings, heat islands rarely occur, so the thermometers remain below the 40&nbsp;°C mark in most of the city, even in the hottest months of the year.

According to data from the Integrated Center for Agrometeorological Information (CIIAGRO/SP), referring to the period from December 1993 to January 2011 and from February 2016, the absolute minimum temperature recorded in Paulinia was 0&nbsp;°C in June 1994, on 26 and 27 June, and the highest reached 40.6&nbsp;°C on 8 October 2020. The highest rainfall accumulations recorded in 24 hours, equal to or greater than 100&nbsp;mm, were 119.4&nbsp;mm on 1 December 2003, 118.6&nbsp;mm on 17 November 2003, and 103.4&nbsp;mm on 22 December 2020.