Daily News

Sumitomo Chemical (Tokyo, Japan) has completed the construction of a pilot facility to establish a highly efficient process for producing methanol from CO2 at its Ehime Works, located in Niihama City, Ehime Prefecture, Japan, and has commenced operations at the facility.

With effect from January 2, 2024, SÜDPACK (Ochsenhausen, Germany) has acquired additional shares of CARBOLIQ GmbH (Remscheid, Germany) and appointed Dirk Hardow as Managing Director.

In its efforts to scale-up chemical recycling, Neste (Espoo, Finland) has successfully concluded another series of industrial-scale processing runs with increasing volumes of liquefied waste plastic at its refinery in Porvoo, Finland.

Although efforts to improve the collection and recycling of plastics to achieve a circular economy are increasing significantly, some (synthetic) materials will eventually always end up in the environment due to e.g. littering, weathering, and abrasion.

LyondellBasell (Rotterdam, Netherlands) has been selected to receive a EUR 40 million grant from the European Union (EU) Innovation Fund. The grant will support the fully electrified, industrial-scale advanced recycling demonstration plant the company plans to build at its Wesseling, Germany site.

Recently, global packaging developer and manufacturer TIPA (Hod Hasharon, Israel) have launched a first-of-its-kind fully compostable high-barrier coffee capsule lid, in collaboration with technology innovation company ATI (Charleston, SC, USA).

Fishing nets lost at sea are a major source of plastic pollution in the ocean [1]. These so-called "ghost nets" drift globally, ensnaring and killing fish, dolphins, seals, birds, and sea turtles. They can last up to 600 years, releasing microplastics as they slowly degrade.

Toray Industries (Tokyo, Japan), recently announced the successful development of recycled carbon fibre (rCF) derived from the production process of the Boeing 787 components using Toray’s advanced carbon fibre, TORAYCA™.

OMV the integrated energy, fuels & feedstock, and chemicals & materials company headquartered in Vienna, Austria, and Synthos (Oświęcim, Poland), the biggest synthetic rubber producer in Europe with a global reach, recently announced the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU).

Polykemi (Ystad, Sweden) and our subsidiary Scanfill (Sievi, Finland) are now certified according to ISCC PLUS.

APK AG will bring in the new year with its corporate strategy stronger than ever. The company from Merseburg/Leuna, Germany, devoted itself in 2023 to putting in place key elements of its successful expansion as well as to the planning and construction of its next large-scale Newcycling® plant.

Paques Biomaterials (Balk, the Netherlands) and Looop (Venlo, the Netherlands) will collaborate in producing PHA (Polyhydroxyalkanoate) from agri-food waste streams.

Global sports company PUMA (Herzogenaurach, Germany) has recently announced that it has scaled up its textile recycling innovation, RE:FIBRE, replacing recycled polyester with RE:FIBRE technology in all Puma football Club and Federation replica jerseys from 2024 onwards.

The licensed technology completes Sulzer’s (Winterthur, Switzerland) portfolio of licensed technologies for the manufacture of polylactic acid (PLA), an eco-friendly bioplastic.

Phabuilder Biotechnology (Beijing, China) secured an order of millions of USD, one of the largest in the PHA industry so far, aiming to showcase the diverse applications of PHA and transform everyday products.

Bioplastics currently represent roughly 0.5 % of the over 400 million tonnes of plastic produced annually (World plastics production 2022, Plastics Europe, 2023).

The European Bioplastics Conference is Europe’s leading business and discussion forum within the global bioplastics sector.

Neste (Espoo, Finland) has joined forces with Eppendorf (Hamburg, Germany), a leading manufacturer and supplier of laboratory equipment, to advance the development of lab products made with renewable raw materials.

Circa Group AS (Oslo, Norway), Vataset Teollisuus Oy (Helsinki, Finland), and Kemijarvi Biorefinery (Kemijarvi, Finland) have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to evaluate the establishment of a Circa Furacell™ production facility on the Kemijarvi Biopark in Northern Finland.

Trinseo (Wayne, PA, USA), a specialty material solutions provider, is helping advance the potential of sustainable plastics with the inauguration of its next generation, polymethyl methacrylate (PMMA) depolymerization plant in Rho, Italy.

Plastic, made in the traditional petroleum-based method, has served its purpose. The near-perfect packaging material has been instrumental in transforming the world's food supply and can be found in nearly every sector of daily life.

Recently, thyssenkrupp Uhde (Dortmund, Germany) has secured a Basic Engineering Package (BEP) and Front-End Engineering Design (FEED) package for the establishment of a bioplastic plant on the Arabian Peninsula.

Sulzer (Winterthur, Switzerland) is launching a new end-to-end licensed technology – CAPSUL™ – for the continuous manufacturing of polycaprolactone (PCL), a biodegradable polyester often used in the packaging, textile, agricultural, and horticultural industries.

NatureWorks (PLYMOUTH, MN, USA), a leading manufacturer of polylactic acid (PLA) biopolymers made from renewable resources, recently announced the appointment of Erik Ripple as the company’s new President and Chief Executive Officer.

Wageningen University & Research has assessed the environmental impacts and circularity of different materials for single serve coffee capsules, when subjected to various end-of-life scenarios

New thinking and terminology is needed to meet climate goals and secure sustainable carbon supply.

AIMPLAS (Valencia, Spain), the Plastics Technology Centre, has been authorized by DIN CERTCO (TÜV Rheinland – Cologne, Germany), an independent European certification company in the bioplastics market, to perform biodegradability and compostability tests in its testing laboratories, which will allow bioplastics businesses to obtain the ecolabels DIN Industrial Compostable, DIN Home Compostable, and DIN Biodegradable Soil.

Neste (Espoo, Finland), Mitsui Chemicals (Tokyo, Japan), and Prime Polymer (Tokyo, Japan), a subsidiary of Mitsui Chemicals, are working together to provide more sustainable food packaging solutions for CO-OP, a brand of the Japanese Consumers Co-operative Union (JCCU – Tokyo, Japan).

INEOS Styrolution (Frankfurt/M, Germany), the global leader in styrenics, recently announced that EdilPlast SRL (Atessa, Italy), part of First Corporation group, has chosen the company’s sustainable styrenics solutions for their latest generation of building products.

PureCycle (Orlando, FL, USA), recently, sent out a commercial shipment of Ultra-Pure Recycled (UPR) resin to Milliken & Company (Spartanburg, SC, USA), a diversified manufacturer with expertise in polymer additive and colourant technology.