Elastomers for Sustainability IV Report

?

 ?

London – Previously entered projects dominated the fourth staging of the Elastomers for Sustainability (E4S IV) programme, which highlights the most significant sustainability projects in the global elastomers/rubber industry.

Indeed, the top four entrants earned their high rankings from the independent E4S expert panel largely on the strength of updates showing evidence of significant technical or commercial progress to their projects.

JSR scored highest by providing further details of how the tailored molecular structure provided by its HSBR technology delivers major physical property improvements. Importantly, the Japanese company also reported that tires employing this technology are now in commercial use.

LIkewise, Nynas came back with a lot more details about its bio-process oil project, in response to the judging panel’s request for more verification of test results and evidence of commercialisation than provided with the original entry.

Scoring the Swedish supplier significantly higher this time around, one judge commented: “They seem to be tackling the bigger picture and can work in both tires and IRG [industrial rubber goods]. The potential impact has to be huge.”

In the previous E4S, project updates propelled UPM’s renewable fubnctional fillers (RFF) project up to fourth place in the table. For E4S IV, UPM further underlined the continuing momentum behind this project.

Similarly, ETB has made substantial strides with its bio-based butadiene production project that scoring highly in the very first E4S programme in May 2020 – reaching second place in our Top 10 rankings. 

The original project entry cited several commercial partnerships, though details were limited for contractual reasons. However, the Russian company has announced a collaboration with Trinseo to explore commercialisation of the technology.

The partners envisage starting up a pilot plant employing technology from both companies. The unit is to produce bio-butadiene from ethanol feedstock via ETB's catalyst and single-stage process technology.

ETB also reported recent commercial agreements towards establishing a facility at a major European petrochemicals site, as well as strong demand for its bio-based monomers from the synthetic rubber industry.

Breaking the trend, Asahi Kasei weighed in with a new application for its styrenic block copolymer technology, employing advanced partial-hydrogenation and functionalisation chemistries.

The judging panel was impressed by how the molecular architecture, which can reduce the mixing temperature with bitumen and the amount of polymer added. It also lowers degradation via ageing and enhances adhesion to aggregates, thereby extending service-life of pavements.

Tyromer previously came close to topping the original E4S table with stand-out progress in the field of devulcanisation. The latest updates indicated continuing progress in addressing the technical and commercial challenges attached to this important recycling route.

Going forward, it will be interesting to see if former top-ranked projects – including the current sixth-to-ninth placed entries from Techsyn, ExxonMobil, Versalis and Asahi Kasei respectively – can regain higher positions by providing further news about their projects. 

To ensure all top-rated projects are ‘live’, E4S entrants are required to supply information showing significant technical and/or commercial progress. Otherwise, project scores are reduced by at least 10% in subsequent E4S rankings.

Therefore, the current Top 10 cannot rest on the laurels, with new sustainability projects in the pipeline and on-going developments to previous E4S projects from the likes of Cabot, Continental, Covestro, Evonik, Kraton, Kuraray, Mitsubishi Chemical and Semperit, among others.

?

Full details of the E4S IV TOP 10 can be downloaded from the Technical Papers section of the ERJ homepage - click the Technology Focus tab on the top menu bar. 

?