NEWS Sirmax ups focus on FR products
Italian compounder Sirmax is responding to North American demand for fire resistant products by dedicating a line to produc- tion of flame retardant PP compounds at its plant at Anderson in Indiana, US. “Over the past year, sales and market demand for flame retardant compounds have increased dramatically, so we have made the decision to dedicate one of our five production lines to this family of materials,” said Lorenzo Ferro, Country Manager of Sirmax North America. The Anderson site, which produces mineral and glass
IN BRIEF...
The European Commis- sion announced last month it is to maintain long-standing anti-dump- ing duties of up to 19.9% on continuous glass fibre products from certain Chinese producers. The move is the latest exten- sion of duties that have been in place since 2011. https://commission.
europa.eu/
Koinos Capital is the new majority owner of Ultra- batch, acquiring a majority stake in the Italian additive producer from founders Pietro Csergo and Andrea Moretti. The company, which produces anti-block, antioxidant, anti-static and antifog masterbatches, reported sales of more than €30m for 2022.
www.ultrabatch.it
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Compounder sees growing US demand for flame retardant PP compounds
reinforced technical PP compounds from virgin, recycled and bio-based feedstocks and has a capacity of 45,000 tonnes/yr,
has already developed several FR PP grades that meet what it describes as growing local demand. Sirmax reports consider-
able interest in FR grades from the automotive sector, where moves toward electric vehicles is leading car manufacturers to consider materials with improved fire safety characteristics. Other application sectors are said to include household appliances such as stoves and washers, as well as water heater casings and power tools. The company said
interest in specialty self- extinguishing materials is increasing globally; it said it has also recently increased capacity at its production plants in Poland. �
www.sirmax.com
SABIC launches Noryl PCR grades
SABIC has introduced a number of new Noryl modified polyphenylene ether (PPE) grades formu- lated with 25% or more post-consumer mechanical- ly-recycled content. They include unfilled and glass reinforced versions. The PCR technology has been validated through several grades, including Noryl NH5120RC3 resin. This contains 30% PCR content, which helps lower its global warming potential (GWP) by 10% over the incumbent fossil-based grade. It is offers
halogen-free flame retard- ance (UL94 V1 at 1.5mm) and is pitched at applications such as HVAC enclosures. “Developing PPE-based engineering resins with high percentages of recycled material is not trivial and poses a range of technical challenges,” said Luc Govaerts, Technology
Director, Specialties, at SABIC. “Depending on application requirements, customers may be able to replace incumbent, fossil- based Noryl grades with our new PCR-based technology and achieve desired performance while reducing their carbon footprint.” �
www.sabic.com
FRX Innovations losses mount
Sustainable flame-retardant developer FRX Innovations posted an operating loss for 2022 of $6.7m on revenues of $3.1m. Net losses
COMPOUNDING WORLD | August 2023
reached $14.2m. It says the below-estimates result was in part due to market weakness resulting from Russia’s war in the Ukraine
and post-COVID effects, which has prompted customers to run inventory down.
www.frx-innovations.com
www.compoundingworld.com
IMAGE: SABIC
IMAGE: SIRMAX
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