REINFORCEMENT | NATURAL FIBRES AND FILLERS
development and approval purposes. UPM says the BioMotion RFF is CO2
is expected to be CO2
-neutral and -negative at industrial scale,
based on third-party verified life-cycle analysis, according to Barbara Gall, Manager of Business Development, Renewable Functional Filler, at UPM Biochemicals. The filler will have more than 94% renewable carbon content (certified by DIN CERTCO) and will be high purity (low VOCs and sulphur content).
Nymax Bio is a new line of PA compounds from
Above: Avient says the renewable filler content in its Nymax Bio PA compounds offers a sustain- able option for consumer brands
black or precipitated silica. In thermoplastics and thermoplastic elastomers, RFF may have two different uses, says Christian Hübsch, Director Sales and Marketing, UPM Biochemicals (a UPM group company based in Germany). One application for RFF is as a black pigment to replace pigment carbon blacks. A second is to use high RFF filler loadings to increase renewable content and reduce carbon footprint, while maintaining acceptable mechanical properties. “So far, we have made compounds with up to 30-40% by weight of RFF in PE, PP, PBAT, and others,” says Hübsch. While RFF is frequently used to replace polymer in a compound formulation, it can also be used to substitute traditional fillers to obtain part weight savings. “With a density of only 1.3 g/cm3
, RFF is
50-60% lighter than most white fillers,” says Hübsch. Hübsch says RFF is different from cellulose
fibre-based compounds or wood-plastics compos- ites. “Thermoplastic compounds with high loadings of RFF represent a completely new class of material, with enormous future potential. RFF is essentially VOC-free, and we are in the process of collecting all data necessary for certification for food-contact and drinking-water contact,” he says. UPM has opened an Application Development
Centre on the site at Leuna and has started product testing and development as well as compounding services. “We see our company as a partner for masterbatchers and compounders,” says Hübsch. “Still, we do a lot of compound development activities ourselves. We run both customer-specific compound optimisation programmes and more fundamental studies in parallel, for a broad range of polymers and applications.” The industrial biorefinery is expected to start up
in late 2023, and first commercial quantities should be available in early 2024. Currently, material samples of up to a few hundred kilograms are being tested by selected partners for compound
22 COMPOUNDING WORLD | May 2022
Avient that contain between 16 and 47% filler from renewable plant-based sources, such as corn, straw and wheat. “Sustainability is a high priority for consumer brands. Most have initiatives built around bringing more environmentally friendly products to market,” says Matt Mitchell, Director, Global Marketing, Specialty Engineered Materials at the company. Avient says that, compared to traditional PA66
glass fibre-reinforced alternatives, the bio-derived grades offer lower warpage together with very good surface appearance and colorability. The low-water-absorption formulations are also said to display very good dimensional stability and property retention after conditioning. The new grades are expected to find application in automotive, consumer, industrial, and construc- tion applications and can be processed by injection moulding or extrusion. They can also be custom formulated to provide specific performance attributes, such as laser welding or flame retard- ance. Nymax Bio materials are manufactured in Asia but are available globally.
Reliable hemp Regulations in the US changed in 2018 to allow growing of hemp and, since then, biotech com- pany Heartland Industries has been working to create a “reliable industrial hemp supply chain” to provide carbon-negative additives for plastics. “De-risking and scaling are two key variables in
creating a reliable supply chain,” according to John Ely, CMO at Heartland. “We have created simple operating procedures that any farmer can follow to have a successful crop (much like corn and soy). This is paramount in the pursuit of reducing the risk for banks and insurance agencies. In addition to that, we work alongside farmers in different regions of the US to improve the resiliency of a crop in case there are weather related incidents.” Ely says that the first major US harvest is antici-
pated this year, and he expects to see commercial contracts in Q4 2022 for hemp additives. Heartland announced a joint development
www.compoundingworld.com
IMAGE: AVIENT/GETTY IMAGES
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