From the Sector

• Carbios’ biorecycling and biodegradation technologies internationally recognized by consumers as promising answers to their top environmental concerns
• Carbios’ innovations considered one of the best for solving recycling effectively and achieving a real plastic circularity
• Consumer research including qualitative and quantitative fields was conducted between March and August 2022. The research institute, Strategic Research, conducted 6000 interviews in Europe and USA

Carbios’ biorecycling and biodegradation technologies acclaimed by consumers
During the first research field study, respondents were exposed to Carbios’ biorecycling process; a new enzyme-based biotechnology that enables biological recycling of all types of PET plastic waste (including bottles, packaging and textiles), and pushes the boundaries of recycling in terms of the number of cycles.

The research results demonstrated that European and US respondents find Carbios’ biorecycling technology more unique and innovative than traditional PET recycling (i.e. thermo-mechanical recycling), as well as more relevant in its ability to address their concerns and challenges regarding recycling.

In the second research study, conducted in the US, respondents were also exposed to Carbios’ biodegradation technology: an innovative enzymatic solution by which an enzyme is incorporated into plastics during the production process of bio-sourced PLA plastics (corn, sugar cane). This approach makes the material made from plants 100% compostable at ambient temperatures and degradable like plants with the built-in enzyme biologically breaking the bioplastic down in less than eight weeks without microplastics or toxic residues; creating a fully organic circularity.

Similarly to Carbios’ biorecycling technology, Carbios’ PLA biodegradation innovation caught US respondents’ attention with 64% overall liking it. Additionally, 93% of the respondents sampled described the concept as innovative, unique, easy to understand (49%), and believable (43%). Up to 82% of the most environmentally engaged respondents declared they would definitely buy more products made with Carbios’ fully circular biodegradable bioplastic.

Consumers: No other choice but to make plastic fully circular
The research says 99% of the respondents consider it important to protect the environment, while plastic pollution is now ranked the third most-concerning environmental issues after climate change and ocean pollution.

This awareness brings most of these consumers to be environmentally active when it comes to purchasing goods and sorting. For the US respondents, eco-friendly packaging comes in the fourth place in terms of purchase drivers for packaged goods and 65% of them declare sorting plastic from general waste on a regular basis, which makes plastic the most sorted type of waste.

Nevertheless, for a vast majority of the respondents across geographies, even if they would like to reduce their plastic consumption most of the time there is no suitable alternative that is as convenient, light, and cost-efficient as plastics. Hence in an ideal world, consumers would like all plastic waste in landfills and oceans to be collected, cleaned, reused and recycled.

Carbios published its operating and financial results for the first half of 2022. The financial statements as of June 30, 2022 were approved by Carbios' Board of Directors.

• Project to build the world's first PET biorecycling plant, in partnership with Indorama Ventures, the world's largest manufacturer of recycled PET: Establishment in France with strong backing from national government and the Grand-Est Region
• On track to bring recycled PET from Carbios' proprietary innovation process to market by 2025
• Fully operational industrial demonstration plant and step-by-step technological validation of the scale-up of the industrial solution designed and developed by Carbios
• Launch of a textile consortium in partnership with On, Patagonia, PUMA and Salomon
• Scientific article in the prestigious Biophysical Journal
• Carbios strengthens its Governance and Management team
• Carbios enhance its financial structure, banking the €30 million loan from the European Investment Bank (EIB)
• Carbios Group's net cash position: €121 million at June 30, 2022

See the full report here.

Carbios has signed an agreement with On, Patagonia, PUMA, and Salomon, to develop solutions that will enhance the recyclability and circularity of their products.
 
An important element of the two-year deal will be to speed up the introduction of Carbios’ biorecycling technology, which constitutes a breakthrough for the textile industry. Carbios and the four companies will also research how products can be recycled, develop solutions to take-back worn polyester items, including sorting and dismantling technologies, and gather data on fiber-to-fiber recycling as well as circularity models.
 
The challenge the four brands share, is that their ambitious sustainable development goals can only partially be met by conventional recycling technologies which mostly target bottle-to-fiber recycling. Future regulations will require more circularity in packaging and textile. Yet the market consensus is that there will soon be a shortage of PET bottles, as they will be used for circular production methods in the Food & Beverage Industry.   
 
Carbios’ innovative process constitutes a technological breakthrough for the recycling of polyester (PET) fibers, which are widely used in apparel, footwear and sportswear, on their own or together with other fibers. PET polyester is the most important fiber for the textile industry with 52 MT produced, even surpassing cotton at 23MT. The biorecycling process uses an enzyme capable of selectively extracting the polyester, recovering it to recreate a virgin fiber. This revolutionary technology makes it possible to recover the PET polyester present in all textile waste that cannot be recycled using traditional technologies.
 
PET plastics and fibers are used to make everyday consumer goods such as bottles, packaging and textiles. Today, most PET is produced from fossil resources, then used and discarded according to a wasteful linear model. By creating a circular economy from used plastics and fibers, Carbios’ biorecycling technology offers a sustainable and more responsible solution.