Issue 02/2019

daily upated news at
www.bioplasticsmagazine.com
News
Aimplas official test
site for TÜV Austria
Anellotech & partners:
biobased paraxylene
Companies seeking to gain OK Compost Industrial,
OK Compost Home, OK Biodegradable Soil and Seedling
certification and labels can now turn to the laboratories
of research institute AIMPLAS (Paterna, Spain) for the
required tests.
Aimplas has now been officially recognised for that
purpose by TÜV Austria, the independent certification
body who, in December 2017 acquired the OK brand and
certification scheme OK Compost developed by Belgian
body Vinçotte NV.
The laboratories of Aimplas had already significantly
increased the scope of their accreditations in 2017
when they obtained the ENAC - the Spanish National
Accreditation Entity - accreditation for biodegradation
under composting conditions and in soil tests, as well as
disintegration tests. This placed the technology centre at
the forefront of accredited tests for plastic materials in
Europe.
TÜV Austria's environment product verification
marks offer a customized certification label for each
biodegradation environment. The labels are widely
recognised and trusted internationally by end customers.
Hence, all components, inks and additives in certified
packaging or products bearing the OK Compost Industrial
label are biodegradable in an industrial composting
plant. The OK Compost Home certification ensures these
will biodegrade in home compost, at a lower temperature
than industrial composting, while the OK Biodegradable
Soi label ensures that a product is biodegradable in soil.
The Seedling logo, authorised by European Bioplastics,
identifies products in compliance with EN 13432 as
compostable. Obtaining these labels includes ecotoxicity
tests to assess compost quality and to ensure that there
are no adverse effects on the environment. MT
www.aimplas.es
U.S. sustainable technology company Anellotech (Pearl
River, New York and its joint development partners IFPEN
and Axens have processed renewably-sourced aromatics
made at Anellotech’s TCat- 8 ® pilot plant to successfully
recover high-purity biobased paraxylene – a key component
for making 100% biobased PET a reality.
This is a key development milestone for Anellotech
and global consumer beverage company Suntory, as the
two partners will collaborate to produce bioPET bottles.
Anellotech, IFPEN and Axens will now purify additional
paraxylene to create pilot sample 100% bioPET beverage
bottles – as well as sample quantities of biobased benzene
whose derivatives (nylon, ABS, polycarbonate, linear alkyl
benzene) are used in clothing, toys, mobile phones and
laundry detergent.
Anellotech has been producing renewably-sourced
aromatics for purification by IFPEN and Axens in Europe.
Since the announcement of a successful two-week
continuous trial in March 2018 at Anellotech’s TCat-8 pilot
plant at Silsbee, Texas, over 4,000 hours of cumulative onstream
time have been achieved.
An initial volume of high-purity bio-paraxylene test
samples have completely met all of the ASTM International
specifications for downstream derivatives in conversion
to PET. As larger amounts of paraxylene are purified,
Anellotech will begin to make renewable PET resin for
prototype bottle manufacture and product trials. This
will be the industry’s first major production of bio-PET
from continuous, cost- effective processing of non-food
biomass.
As well as bio-paraxylene, Anellotech continues to
work on the recovery of bio-benzene and toluene from
TCat-8 output. Separation and purification of highpurity
bio-benzene will enable sample volumes of a
range of important biobased polymers such as nylons,
polycarbonate, polystyrene and acrylonitrile-butadienestyrene
(ABS) to be produced. MT
www.anellotech.com
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Here’s a look at our most popular online content of the past two months.
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tinyurl.com/news 20190220
Newest market and trend report: 2018 was a very good year
for biobased polymers (20 February 2019)
Nova-Institute’s latest market and trend report (...) entitled “Biobased
Building Blocks and Polymers – Global Capacities, Production and Trends
2018-2023”, it shows the production capacities and, for the first time, the
production data for all biobased polymers.
According to this report, the total production volume reached 7.5 million
tonnes in 2018, which equates to about 2% of the production volume of
petrochemical polymers. The potential of these materials is much higher,
the authors note, but the low price of oil combined with the lack of political
support are factors working against their reaching significant growth.
bioplastics MAGAZINE [02/19] Vol. 14 5