Michelin recommends new approach to ‘mass-balance’

London - Michelin has raised concern over issues around the use of  ‘mass balance’ certification to support claims relating to recycled or renewable content in products.

In a recent paper, Brigitte Chauvin, manager R&D materials and Christophe Durand, VP solution material & circularity warned that this approach can lead to a “disconnection” from the true product composition.

To explain these concerns, and recommend a better way forward, Chauvin and Durand have supplied the following statement to ERJ:

Michelin is committed to incorporating sound environmental and scientific approaches that ensure that our products are made with more & more renewable and recycled materials in order to be really impactful on the preservation of the natural resources of the planet.

We are concerned with the growing use of the term ‘mass-balance’ as an umbrella term for a wide range of renewable and recycling activities that are not environmentally responsible nor facilitate a transition from virgin fossil sources.

This is because the term ‘mass-balance’ currently refers to a multitude of possible approaches.

The absence of one clear, robust set of requirements and standards results in opaqueness, misuse, and confusion to the detriment of both producers and consumers.

Therefore, our position encompasses the following points:

Material-product connection

We strongly support a mass-balance standard and approach that maintains a material-product connection – comprised of both a physical and a chemical connectivity/traceability.

This material-product connection is critical and is the only way to ensure traceability of renewable/recycled content while utilizing more efficient large volume production processes. Moreover, a material-production connection is essential to providing long-term incentives for sustainable materials with recycled/renewable physical content.

Credit Transfers

Relatedly, we do not support the use of credit transfers between unrelated chemical processes. While credit transfers might provide short-term flexibility benefits, this method runs the serious risk of undermining trust in all mass-balance approaches as credit transfers do not make it technically possible to find any physical content in the end-product.

Content Attribution

It is our long-term goal to support the utilisation of proportional attribution once the volumes of recycled/renewable raw materials have increased. However, to allow time for scalability to increase, for now we also support fuel exempt attribution as long as there is chemical and physical traceability and a committed roadmap towards segregation or a high level of measurable true content.

Attribution Identification

To facilitate transparency to consumers, we support the development of norms and regulations that differentiate mass-balance approaches that are based on actual content compared to credit attribution. This will ensure that customers can easily recognize trustworthy products that are using an environmentally responsible mass-balance approach.