Biopolymers - Sustainability for the Automotive Value-added Chain
- PDF / 454,429 Bytes
- 4 Pages / 595.276 x 790.866 pts Page_size
- 33 Downloads / 202 Views
Biopolymers – Sustainability for the Automotive Value-added Chain
© Röchling Automotive
AUTHORS
Fabrizio Barillari is Product Manager of Global Bio-Plastics and Battery Solutions in the Propulsion Product Group at Röchling Automotive in Leifers (Italy).
Plastics are quintessential for the automotive industry as a readily available and easy-to-handle material, but consumers are increasingly confronted with images of mountains of rubbish and vast islands of floating plastic. Bioplastics could potentially be part of the solution to the problems associated with conventional plastic. Röchling Automotive has now developed the biopolymer Röchling-BioBoom and optimized it for use in the automotive industry.
MOTIVATION
Fabrizio Chini is Manager Advanced Development Propulsion at Röchling Automotive in Leifers (Italy).
36
The innovation pressure in the auto motive industry has always been strong. But for some time now, the focus has no longer exclusively been on driving pleasure and safety. Concepts aimed at improving sustainability and carbon footprint are now, at least, as import ant to manufacturers and suppliers as t raditional performance metrics and comfort features.
Plastics in particular are coming under scrutiny. Despite that plastic components in modern vehicles are subject to a clearly regulated material identification guide lines, distinctions among the different types of plastic are rarely discussed. Even when all the relevant recycling guidelines are observed, plastic’s carbon footprint still leaves much to be desired. Vehicle manufacturers and suppliers are there fore required to intensively seek alterna tives and new solutions.
The Coronavirus pandemic, which broke out in early 2020, has exposed further need for innovation. Govern ments and regulatory authorities have responded with numerous measures aimed at mitigating the economic impact on the automotive industry. But these aid packages have come with some clear demands: Any purchase incentives and state aid must go hand in hand with not only the promotion of electrification but also the continued reduction of emissions. TRANSFORMING CELLULOSE INTO A MANUFACTURING MATERIAL
There are now numerous solutions available to reduce exhaust emissions. But the production processes behind these solutions rarely come in for scru tiny, even despite the fact that vehicle manufacture offers tremendous sav ings potential. For Röchling Automo tive, b ioplastics represent the next step toward resource-conserving production. The focus here is on CO2 emissions gen erated during production. In collabora tion with partners, a biopolymer that will help to cut emissions dramatically was developed. Compared with fossilfuel-based polymers, bioplastics reduce production emissions by as much as 90 %. FIGURE 1 shows the emissions generated during the production of dif ferent polymers. The inspiration behind the devel opment of the biopolymer RöchlingBioBoom was to use highly available, reasonably priced and, above all, re newable raw materials. It was a
Data Loading...
