GCR accelerates investment with new recycling plant to support circular economy

GCR Group has announced the plan to open a new dedicated recycling plant in Castellet i La Gornal, Barcelona, Spain, enhancing the group’s capability to serve increased global demand for its CICLIC range of recycled polyolefins (R-polyolefins), said the company.

The 200,000 Tonnes (200kT) plant, commissioning in 2023, when fully operational in 2025, will be one of the largest of its kind and is a significant step for the group; the capacity for CICLIC combined with that for the GRANIC® range of sustainable mineral-filled masterbatches and compounds will reach 500kT. GCR has a global reach, exporting 85% of its sales to over 100 countries.

GCR strongly believes collaboration on the developing of new products and applications is essential to accelerate the circular economy. The company hosts the ‘co-creation’ process across the value chain, where brand owners, converters, and suppliers can come together to practically test ideas and create precisely-defined sustainable solutions.

When brand owners think about using recycled plastics, they are often concerned about issues such as consistency of supply, traceability and whether the mechanical performance can match the virgin polymers they currently use. For many development engineers, reaching future internal and external sustainability targets is increasingly challenging. However, GCR’s existing CICLIC up-cycled products and ‘co-creation’ approach to customisation can solve these problems.

The CICLIC -polyolefins are based on up-cycling fully traceable waste streams and can deliver similar and consistent material properties as the virgin plastic. By replacing virgin plastic with these grades, Carbon Footprint certification can be 60-80% lower without compromising performance and quality. GCR believes companies facing sustainability challenges can find the answers through GCR’s products and long experience.

GCR’s extensive experience in polymer materials technology helps develop customised solutions in partnership with suppliers and end customers in a collaborative partnership. The new production plant is complemented by a recently opened Innovation Hub with ‘Co-creation’ space, enabling the development of new formulations and the production and testing of compounds on a pilot plant.

The new plant investment provides sufficient capacity to address high-volume demands in applications such as rigid and flexible packaging, automotive, construction and home and garden markets. In addition, GCR carries out toll manufacturing for food contact applications using advanced recycling technology, enabling impurity-free materials and certified to EuCertPlast.

We remind, BEWI’s acquisition of expandable polystyrene (EPS) and extruded polystyrene (XPS) producer Jackon is expected to conclude in the next one to two weeks. Therefore, the acquisition is expected to be officially completed before the end of October. The acquisition was previously expected to conclude by the end of Q3 2022, following the completion of divestments.
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China Petroleum & Chemical Corporation (HKG: 0386, "Sinopec") has successfully produced China's first batch of large tow carbon fiber at the company's production base in Shanghai, making the company the first in the country and fourth in the world to possess large tow carbon fiber technology, said the company.

Sinopec's production line has adopted its self-developed PAN (polyacrylonitrile) base large tow precursor and carbon fiber technologies. The project is being implemented in two phases and expects to be in full production in 2024, projecting an annual production capacity of 24,000 tons of protofilament and 12,000 tons of large tow carbon fiber.

Large tow carbon fiber refers to roving that contains 48,000 filaments or more. The high-performance material is often referred to as the "king of new material" and "black gold." The product developed and manufactured by Sinopec Shanghai is a new type of high-strength carbon fiber with a carbon content of over 95 percent. It has outstanding excellent mechanical properties and a specific gravity that's less than one fourth of the steel, yet a strength that's seven to nine times stronger. It is also corrosion resistant.

As the material can be widely used in producing parts and components, it is expected to be used for an increasing amount of industrial infrastructure projects in China, including ones related to wind power, solar power, high-speed rail, and aviation.

"Sinopec has customized a special production line for large tow carbon fiber, including production equipment and techniques, which has enabled us to design oxidizing furnaces and carbide furnaces that revolutionizes not only the core technology of temperature field control, but also has a revolutionary energy-saving design, marking a major milestone in the development of China's carbon fiber industry," said Huang Xiangyu, carbon fiber expert and deputy general manager of Sinopec Shanghai.

Sinopec now owns 251 patents related to carbon fiber and 46 patents for carbon fiber composite materials, the largest number in China and third in the world, and through scaled up investment and industrial layout, Sinopec is committed to being a major contributor to the development of China's carbon fiber industry.

We remind, Sinopec reported its H1 net profit rose 10% Y/Y, mostly due to significant improvement in its upstream business. The Chinese oil producer said H1 net profit jumped to 43.53B yuan (~$6.33B) and revenues rose 28% Y/Y to 1.58T yuan, due to higher prices of major refined oil and chemical products, and increased sales volumes for some petroleum and petrochemical products. H1 operating costs jumped 33% Y/Y to 1.33T yuan due to higher purchase costs for outsourced crude oil and other raw materials.

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Celanese Corporation, a global chemical and specialty materials company, announced the publication of its 2021-2022 Sustainability Report, Accelerating Solutions Through Chemistry, and its complementary 2021-2022 Sustainability Index, said the company.

This year’s report highlights the company’s progress and investments as it drives environmental, social and governance (ESG) initiatives across its global enterprise and continues to innovate for a sustainable future. The associated index provides a comprehensive view of ESG resources and disclosures, including alignment with sustainability frameworks and ESG-related policies, practices, and metrics.

“Celanese is committed to improving the world and well-positioned to develop innovative customer solutions that help meet the world’s sustainability challenges,” said Lori Ryerkerk, Celanese chairman, chief executive officer and president. “Our focus on making a difference guides our investments in our operations, our employees and our communities."

Leveraging its four strategic pillars, Elements of Opportunity, Celanese demonstrated its sustainability progress by:

Advancing Safe and Sustainable Customer Solutions

• Announcing the pending acquisition of the majority of DuPont’s Mobility & Materials (M&M) business, supporting growth in future mobility, connectivity and medical applications.

• Launching new, more sustainable polyacetal (POM) and polybutylene terephthalate (PBT) product offerings, POM ECO-B and PBT ECO-B. Both leverage the mass balance concept to produce products from biowaste-based sources.

• Receiving a grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to produce a prototype for a refillable contraceptive implant that has the potential to expand global access to women’s health solutions where options may be otherwise limited.

We remind, the European Commission has approved the proposed USD11 billion acquisition of Dupont's mobility and materials business by U.S. chemicals company Celanese Corp (CE.N), on the condition that the latter divests a plastics-producing business. Celanese announced the deal in February but had to offer remedies to address EU antitrust concerns. The combined entity would have been the largest producer of thermoplastic copolyester (TPC) in the European Economic Area and globally, with only a few alternative suppliers remaining. The product is primarily used by automakers.
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With the aim of determining the sortability of PLA from municipal mixed plastic waste, TotalEnergies Corbion and TOMRA Recycling conducted a sorting test in August 2022, said the company.

The outcome confirmed, as has been confirmed many times before, that sorting PLA from other plastics waste is easy and straight-forward. Using a Near Infra-Red (NIR) sorting machine, PLA trays mixed with other post-consumer plastic items were fully recovered with a very high purity at the TOMRA center in Mulheim-Karlich, Germany. Also when the PET bottle fraction was sorted from the mixed plastics waste stream, no PLA trays ended up in the PET stream. This realistic and industrial test shows that PLA is sortable and will not contaminate other recycling streams.

“Plastic waste collectors and sorters know that using the infrared technology, PLA plastic products can easily be sorted from other municipal waste. In closed loop environments, where PLA bottles and PLA cups are exclusively used, the amount of PLA is sufficiently high to also make it economically feasible to collect, sort and clean the PLA”, says Jurgen Priesters, SVP TOMRA Feedstock.

TotalEnergies Corbion is actively collecting used PLA products from closed loop systems and pre consumer waste. The collected PLA waste is used as feedstock for making rPLA and will help divert PLA from ending up in landfill or incineration. It also further reduced the carbon footprint of PLA and rPLA reduces the need for biomass and land use. Luminy® rPLA, containing 20% post-industrial and post-consumer PLA waste is commercially available.

“In collaboration with Tomra, a leading supplier of waste sorting equipment, we confirmed (again!) that PLA can be effectively sorted from other municipal plastic waste using existing separation equipment. Claims that PLA contaminates PET recycle streams have again proven to be nonsense. Many other studies, as cited in our white paper about end of life options for PLA, have confirmed exactly the same." says Francois de Bie, Senior Marketing and Supply Chain Director at TotalEnergies Corbion. He continues, "In short no technical barrier exist that prevent an effective separation of PLA from other plastic waste."

We remind, the Flemish government recently awarded TotalEnergies the contract to install 1,500 electric vehicle charging points in Antwerp. In the heart of Europe and in Belgium's most populous city, the company is reinforcing its commitment to offering and developing sustainable mobility, with the aim of becoming Belgium's leading company in the public charging market by 2024.

TotalEnergies is a global multi-energy company that produces and markets energies: oil and biofuels, natural gas and green gases, renewables and electricity. Our more than 100,000 employees are committed to energy that is ever more affordable, cleaner, more reliable and accessible to as many people as possible.
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Linde has strengthened its commitment to sustainability having become the latest signatory to the United Nations Global Compact (UNGC), the world’s largest corporate sustainability initiative, said Gasworld.

By signing up to the initiative, Linde aims to align its strategy and activities with the UNGC’s Ten Principles in the areas of human rights, labour, the environment and anti-corruption. With 13,000 corporate participants and other stakeholders over 170 countries, the UNGC promotes two main objectives: ‘Mainstream the ten principles in business activities around the world’, and ‘Catalyse actions in support of broader UN goals.’

Broader goals include its Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the latter of which Linde have pledged to help advance. Stating that sustainability is an ‘integral part’ of what the company does every day, Tamara Brown, Vice President Sustainability, Linde, added that it has helped build an inclusive culture that values its people and respects human rights.

“Linde is already aligned with the Principles at the heart of the Compact and is proud to join this initiative, which aims to address some of the world’s most pressing challenges,” she said.

As per MRC, Linde has completed their efforts as part of implementing the Amur Gas Chemical Complex (AGCC) construction project. "Linde has completed its work within the AGCC project framework. We are dealing with its adaptation to new conditions together with partners from Sinopec," the Russian chemical giant said. Early in 2020, Linde made the contract for provision of pyrolysis services for AGCC. The Amur Gas Chemical Complex is the joint venture of Sibur (60%) and China’s Sinopec (40%) for polyethylene and polypropylene production. The capacity of the plant will be up to 2.7 mln tonnes of polymers annually.
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