PPG launches paint films JV with Entrotech

PPG will deliver paint and clear film solutions for automotive and industrial customers through PPG Advanced Surface Technologies, a new joint venture formed with entrotech, Inc., said the company.

PPG announced that it will deliver paint and clear film solutions for automotive and industrial customers through PPG Advanced Surface Technologies, a new joint venture formed with entrotech, Inc., a provider of technology-driven film solutions. PPG retains a majority stake in the joint venture. Specific financial and ownership terms were not disclosed.

Paint films are multilayer applications in which at least one layer is made from paint. They provide a range of environmental benefits, including lower energy consumption, as well as new aesthetic options. The technology is currently used for automotive applications and has potential applications across a range of industrial end-uses.

“This joint venture will position our portfolio of paint films products for accelerated commercialization, offering customers innovative products with high performance and significant sustainability benefits,” said Tim Knavish, PPG president and chief executive officer. “This venture will be positioned for rapid global expansion aligned to PPG’s portfolio.”

PPG established its paint films capabilities in 2021 with the acquisition of Worwag, a Germany-based coatings supplier that provides film products for a variety of automotive parts and panels. The JV will consist of the PPG Worwag film assets and the automotive films business of entrotech.

The automotive films portfolio of entrotech includes automotive clear protective films and the Aero Sustainable Material Technology line of paint films. The company’s patented and patent-pending technologies were originally developed in 2007 to meet the demanding requirements of motorsports and other applications.

In 2019, Aero films were first used on commercial automotive vehicle exteriors. The company has since further developed the technology for potential use in commercial transportation, marine, construction and other areas in which PPG operates.

“We are excited to join the global PPG family through this joint venture,” said Jim McGuire, entrotech founder and CEO. “This agreement builds on a long collaboration, as we use PPG paint products to create our paint films. We look forward to expanding our reach globally with the PPG paint films team through this partnership.”

We remind, PPG will invest USD11 million to double the production capacity of its powder coatings plant in San Juan del Rio, Mexico. The expansion project is expected to be completed by mid-2023 and will allow the plant to meet the expected future demand for powder coatings in Mexico.

PPG is a leading supplier of powder coatings to the automotive, transportation, appliance, furniture and other markets. The company expanded the business with its 2020 acquisition of Alpha Coating Technologies, which manufactures powder coatings for light industrial applications and heat-sensitive substrates, and its 2021 acquisition of Worwag, which makes liquid, powder and film coatings for industrial and automotive applications. PPG recently agreed to acquire the powder coatings business of Arsonsisi, including a manufacturing plant in Verbania, Italy.

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Chevron Phillips Chemical has joined Circulate Capital, an investor advancing a circular economy for plastics in growing nations, to launch of a USD65 million initiative to combat plastic pollution in Latin America and the Caribbean, said the company.

CPChem is one of a group of investors pledging to support the initiative, which will initially target Brazil, Chile, Colombia and Mexico before expanding across the region. The goal of the initiative is to scale the recycling supply chain, address climate change and improve the economies of the affected nations, investors said.

“We have identified promising opportunities across Latin America that, if scaled, could turn the tide on the plastic waste crisis in the region,” said Rob Kaplan, CEO and founder of Circulate Capital. “By applying the lessons and best practices from our years of work in South and Southeast Asia, we are confident that we can support solutions in Latin America’s high-growth markets to create circularity at scale. Our corporate partners will also play a critical, strategic role in helping best-in-class recyclers to connect with global supply chains, and we look forward to their collaboration.”

In addition to CPChem, IDB Lab, Builders Vision, Danone, Dow, Mondelez International and Unilever are participating in the initiative.

The growing economies across Latin America and the Caribbean have advanced faster than their waste management and recycling infrastructures have developed, according to the United Nations. This has created the opportunity to strengthen the recycling value chain across the region.

We remind, Chevron Lummus Global LLC (CLG) announced a recent contract award from Petroleo Brasileiro S.A. (Petrobras) for a new 12,580 BPD hydroisodewaxing (HIDW) unit at the GasLub Hub, a lubricant plant in Itaborai, Rio de Janeiro state, Brazil. Chevron Lummus Global's scope includes the technology license, basic design engineering, and research unit testing services.

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Trinseo, a specialty material solutions provider, announced the inauguration of its polycarbonate (PC) dissolution pilot facility in Terneuzen, the Netherlands, said the company.

The new pilot facility is a major step in Trinseo’s commitment to sustainability, part of the journey in realizing the company’s sustainability goals. The guests of honor at the inauguration ceremony included Jo-Annes de Bat, Provincial Executive (responsible for regional economy) of the Netherlands.

Trinseo is excited to announce the inauguration of our polycarbonate (PC) dissolution pilot plant in Terneuzen, the Netherlands. This technology allows us to extract 100% recycled PC for use in new materials.

An essential element of Trinseo’s innovation is focused on developing and delivering sustainable solutions. Across all businesses, this is a driving force behind our R&D efforts. While we are currently in the R&D phase, the state-of-the-art pilot facility is situated in a temporary area in Trinseo’s Terneuzen site and will later be moved into the Central Process Research Laboratory in the same site, which is currently under construction.

“Dissolution recycling” is a type of physical recycling process where the needed polymer is extracted by the use of solvents. The extracted polymers will then be used to make new recycled polymers. Trinseo’s PC dissolution technology is an advanced technology by which post- or pre-consumer materials containing PC, be it an automotive or consumer electronics part that is mixed with other plastics, metal or even glass, can be put directly into the solvent without any pre-treatment. The solvent will dissolve PC contained in those end-of-life parts while all other non-PC materials will remain, and can then be used for other recycling purposes. The dissolved PC extracted is 100% recycled PC that could be used for compounding into new materials for an array of applications, such as mobile phone casing, printer enclosure or automotive parts.

“We are very excited to have started up the pilot facility for PC dissolution,” said Francesca Reverberi, Senior Vice President & Chief Sustainability Officer at Trinseo, “This technology deepens the potential in circularity.” “This is a R&D milestone in Trinseo’s sustainability journey,” added Han Hendriks, Senior Vice President, Chief Technology Officer. “With our expanding R&D capabilities and organization, more robust innovations are in the pipeline.”

The pilot plant will play a significant role in helping Trinseo achieve its 2030 Sustainability Goals, while accelerating recycling and increasing the supply of sustainable feedstock.

We remind, Trinseo has added a new grade to its Magnum ABS family. Complementing the bio formulations of the material made with 60 and 80 percent bio-attributed content made available in late 2022, the company has now launched a version with 95 percent mass-balanced renewably sourced content.

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A new strategic partnership between Chinese company Xiamen Changsu Industrial Pte Ltd (Changsu Industrial) and Netherlands-based TotalEnergies Corbion, aimed at further advancing the polylactic acid industry has been announced, said the company.

The focus of the partnership will be on biaxially oriented polylactic acid, or BOPLA. BOPLA is made with biobased PLA using biaxial stretching technology. Changsu Industrial markets its low carbon BOPLA product, currently used in packaging materials, under the BiONLY name.

Asia, especially Thailand, China and South Korea have been pushing ahead in the bioplastics space, both as regards development and production. And in China, the bioplastic industry has seen tremendous growth with new technological breakthroughs in biobased materials after the country issued its Made in China 2025. manufacturing sector development plan, explained Mou Qingying, Changsu Industrial’s vice president.

As a producer of high-performance specialty plastic films, the company focuses on three major product segments: new energy, biodegradable, and functional film materials.

The present partnership with TotalEnergies Corbion will see the market promotion, product development, and research and development of new technologies and applications of BOPLA - all of which will contribute to the worldwide green transformation and help China reach its goal of being carbon-neutral by 2060, said Mou Qingying.
The two companies are already working closely together, efforts which have resulted in the development of BOPLA-based adhesive tapes made from Changsu’s BiONLY which are projected for use by the postal service in China.

New regulations have already been announced to encourage the adoption of biodegradable materials in the country's postal service by 2025 with some cities aiming to achieve this earlier by the end of 2023. With the further tightening of the regulation, BOPLA-based adhesive tapes are expected to experience a wider adoption in the future.

“With increasing needs for sustainable solutions globally, the partnership of Changsu and TotalEnergies Corbion is paving the way for the introduction of more PLA-based innovation to the world. It's a win-win-win for people, industry, and the environment,” said Thomas Philipon, CEO TotalEnergies Corbion.

We remind, TotalEnergies and Paprec, leader in plastic recycling in France, have signed a long-term commercial agreement to develop a French value chain for advanced recycling of plastic film wastes. The agreement will secure the supply of TotalEnergies' future advanced plastic recycling plant in Grandpuits. Following the terms of this agreement, Citeo, the main organization in charge of end-of-life household packaging in France, will provide a stream of flexible plastic waste sorted from post-consumer packaging.

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Iraq is still waiting for a final answer from Turkey to resume its northern oil exports, which run from the semi-autonomous Kurdistan region to the Turkish port of Ceyhan, Iraq's oil minister Hayan Abdel-Ghani said on Tuesday, said Reuters.

Turkey told Baghdad a technical team was evaluating whether the pipeline was damaged as a result of the devastating February earthquake, Abdel-Ghani said. "We are about to send a technical team to evaluate this pipeline so that we are sure that it is ready or if it needs extra checks," Abdel-Ghani added.

Turkey halted Iraq's 450,000 barrels per day (bpd) of northern exports through the Iraq-Turkey pipeline on March 25 after an arbitration ruling by the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC). The ICC ordered Turkey to pay Baghdad damages of USD1.5 B for unauthorized exports by the Kurdistan Regional Government between 2014 and 2018.

Iraq asked Turkey this month to resume pipeline flows and loading operations at Ceyhan on May 13. Turkish pipeline operator BOTAS has yet to receive instruction from Turkish authorities to resume flows, an Iraqi oil official told Reuters on Monday.

"We're talking about weeks, not days, as an expected time frame to resume exports. This issue is more political now than technical," the source said. Iraqi government officials previously told Reuters they blamed elections for the delay.

Turkey held presidential elections on May 14 but neither of the two main candidates exceeded the required 50% of the votes and a run-off is scheduled for May 28.

We remind, Turkey doubled Russian Urals oil imports in the first half of May versus the same period of April, according to Refinitiv Eikon data and Reuters calculations, as the country profits from cheap crude that is sanctioned by the West. Some 193,000 barrels per day (bpd) of the Russian grade were loaded for supplies to Turkey's ports during May 1-15 compared with 96,000 bpd during the same period of April, the data shows.

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