30 Mar 2015
Tokyo – Mitsubishi Chemical Corp. (MCC) has developed “the world’s first bio-based polycarbonatediol” and will begin worldwide market development and sales in April, the company has announced.
The product is produced from renewable bio-based raw materials and is of an entirely different composition than any other currently available, according to a 25 March statement.
MCC said it uses proprietary manufacturing processes to produce the new polycarbonatediols which can be used as monomers for the production of thermoplastics polyurethanes and thermoplastic elastomers.
End product materials, claims MCC, exhibit superior mechanical properties, flexibility at low temperatures, chemical resistance, abrasion resistance, and high hardness. These characteristics, it said, were difficult to achieve with currently available polycarbonatediols.
MCC currently has the capacity to produce some 1,000 tonnes a year of the new polycarbonatediol, and plans to expand production capacity as demand increases.
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