From the Sector

As part of Suominen Corporation’s Half-Year Financial Report for January 1 – June 30, 2021 the company shared their insights and actions defined in their sustainability agenda.
A new Code of Conduct was launched in the beginning of 2021 and a mandatory training program about the Code will be start in the third quarter of this year.

Suominen is committed to continuously improving their production efficiency and the efficient utilization of natural resources. What active measures towards reducing energy consumption, greenhouse gas emissions, water consumption and waste to landfill are concerned, the commitment is to diminish them by 20% per ton of product by 2025 compared to the base year of 2019.
Offering a comprehensive portfolio of sustainable nonwovens and continuously developing new and innovative solutions with a reduced environmental impact, the target is a 50% increase in sales of sustainable nonwovens by 2025 compared to 2019, and to have at least 10 sustainable product launches per year. During the first half of the year, nine sustainable product launches were made.

OUTLOOK FOR 2021
As announced on August 12, 2021 Suominen expects that its comparable EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization) in 2021 will decrease from 2020 due to the slowdown in the demand for nonwovens in the second half of 2021 as well as some continuing volatility in the raw material and transportation markets. In 2020, Suominen’s comparable EBITDA was EUR 60.9 million.

• Goal: Creating a unique portfolio in high-value surfactants

Indorama Ventures Public Company Limited (IVL), a global chemicals producer, today announced it agreed to acquire Brazil-based Oxiteno S.A. Indústria e Comércio, a subsidiary of Ultrapar Participações S.A. The acquisition gives IVL a unique portfolio in high-value surfactants and significantly extends its existing Integrated Oxides and Derivatives (IOD) business.

IVL will purchase Oxiteno for US$1.3 billion (subject to adjustments at closing), with a deferred payment of $150 million in 2024. The transaction is subject to customary conditions to closing, including approval of relevant regulatory authorities. The transaction is expected to close in Q1 2022 and will be earnings accretive immediately. Financing is secured through deferred payment, using existing extra cash on our balance sheet, free cash flow generated from existing businesses, short term loans against working capital and the balance as long-term debt.

Oxiteno is a leading integrated surfactants producer, catering to highly attractive end-use markets in LATAM. The acquisition brings an excellent management team, world-class expertise in green chemistry innovation, strong customer relationships in Brazil, Uruguay and Mexico, and substantial growth potential in attractive end markets, including the U.S. through a new facility in Pasadena, Texas. Oxiteno has a strong commitment to environmental governance, and its focus on lowering greenhouse gas emissions will also enhance IVL’s ESG credentials.

• A new capsule collection colored only using plants and natural elements, signed together by Tonello and WRÅD

A capsule collection of exclusive garments was born, happy, totally natural, healthy and sustainable, free of chemicals hazardous for the environment or humans, hypoallergenic and gentle on the skin, the result of a responsible process, 100% GOTS certified organic cotton.

A collection made possible by the talents of WRÅD and Wake, the innovative organic dyeing system developed by Tonello: healthy for people and for the environment, because it uses only plants and vegetable waste, such as flowers, berries, peels and roots, which are left to dry and then infused, without using harmful chemical additives. It is easy to use, almost like preparing an herbal tea: it is, in fact, a radical paradigm shift.

The naturalness of the pigments used and the desire to create a support that would highlight the real color of emotions: these were the points that unite WRÅD and Tonello, realities that are also physically close, united by the authenticity of their evolutionary promises of change and transformation.

The colors on the garments are alive. Sensitive to light, over time they tend to fade to a lower tone, becoming increasingly sober and authentic, like those who choose to wear these manifesto-garments, which invite, quietly, and with grace and subtlety, a gentle revolution: in the name of respect for the environment and the equilibrium between people and nature.

• Testing and development achieve rigidity and safety milestone

Basaltex, pioneers in innovative uses of basalt fibres, has achieved a significant milestone in developing and testing a new composite material solution comprising fibres of basalt combined with EconCore’s patented honeycomb technology.

This new material development has greatly improved fire resistance and is highly rigid, as well as the usual honeycomb properties of light-weighting.

The company has tested the composite of basalt fibres, a bio resin and rPET honeycomb.

Filaments of only stone fibres are extruded at a temperature of 1450°C, similar to glass but with a number of advantages, not least the absence of boric acid in the process.

Combining this ecological fibre with EconCore’s sustainable technology using rPET, and the bioresin polyfurfuryl alcohol - 100% derived from a waste stream of sugar cane - make this a very sustainable and environmentally friendly product, unlike the majority of thermoset solutions in this type of application.

Railway applications require materials with enhanced fire resistance and the testing has shown that the EconCore-Basaltex solution fits these needs well, at the same time offering the perspective of drastic weight reduction against traditional monolithic GRPs used rather widely in train interiors.

Such sandwich panel could be deployed in applications such as cladding panels, partitions, tables and flooring. The thermoset skin layers give a fast cure at elevated temperature, meaning short cycle time and enabling automated production’.

As well as the railway interior application, this new material combination could be used in any application that requires fire performance combined with a low weight.

• ecorepel® Dry Cleaning Resistant – ecological water repellency that is PFC-free and dry cleaning resistant

In recent years, the textile industry has developed significantly in terms of environmentally-friendly water repellency. Many manufacturers have already successfully replaced textile finishes containing fluorocarbons with fluorocarbon-free (PFC-free) finishes.

Nevertheless, many textiles equipped with alternative finishes are reaching their limits in performance. Especially when it comes to materials that are subject to heavy wear or require a special type of care.

The PFC-free, water-repellent ecorepel® technology launched by schoeller® in 2012 has now been further developed to allow for successful application on textiles and apparel that are “dry clean only.”
ecorepel® DCR achieves impressive water-repellency results, even after several home launderings and professional dry cleaning cycles. The resistance to professional dry cleaning refers to the F-cleaning symbol, which stands for a recommended cleaning process for sensitive fabrics using hydrocarbon solvents. In addition, tests show that materials finished with ecorepel® DCR are highly resistant to abrasion and scuffing.

ecorepel® DCR technology is now available for licensing and can be used in a variety of applications, such as outdoor, sport and fashion apparel, as well as upholstery fabrics.

Dibella's long-standing forwarding partner Hamacher was taken over by the sustainably committed logistics specialist Heppner at the end of 2018. The new constellation takes Dibella another step further in terms of climate-neutral transport: the logistics company, which originates from France, focuses on the environmentally friendly transport of goods and is investing heavily in a carbon dioxide-neutral vehicle fleet.

"With our first sustainability report, we introduced the monitoring of our carbon dioxide emissions. It turned out that the transport of our textiles produces the most climate gases. We have therefore consistently switched to sea freight and almost without exception do not ship goods by air. However, we still see a need for optimisation from the port of Rotterdam to the customer or to our warehouse. After the takeover of our long-standing forwarding partner Hamacher by the logistics specialist Heppner, there is now a breath of fresh air in our climate-friendly delivery initiative. The company is committed to environmentally friendly transports and a low-emission vehicle fleet. Together we now want to look for solutions to make the "last miles" of our deliveries climate gas neutral," says Ralf Hellmann, Managing Director of Dibella.

Departure into a clean future
Spedition Heppner, with its origins in Alsace, is a family-owned company with worldwide operations and 3,320 employees handling more than 72 million freight items annually. More than a decade ago, the logistics specialist began recording the carbon dioxide emissions released by its fleet of vehicles and steadily reducing them by switching to environmentally friendly energy sources. With a mix of gas, bio-fuel and electric drive, the discharge of greenhouse gases caused by the company's trucks is to be reduced by twenty percent by the year 2025. By 2050, the entire fleet should be diesel-free. To achieve a carbon dioxide-neutral footprint, Heppner is also testing hybrid forms of transport (rail, inland waterways, truck) as well as alternative delivery options (cargo bike).

Autoneum carpet systems already meet high standards of sustainable mobility due to their high content of recycled fibers. Thanks to an alternative backcoating (ABC) process, Autoneum carpets are now becoming even more environmentally friendly: By replacing the latex commonly used in standard backcoatings with thermoplastic material, the recyclability of carpets at the end of product life is further  improved. In addition, the innovative manufacturing process greatly reduces water and energy consumption and thus CO2 emissions in production.

Lightweight, textile-based carpet technologies such as Di-Light or Relive-1 significantly improve the environmental performance of carpets. For example, Di-Light-based carpets consist of up to 97% recycled PET; aside from that, they are around 20% lighter than conventional needlepunch carpets, thus contributing to lower fuel consumption and CO2 emissions from vehicles. In addition, Autoneum needlepunch carpets are now even more sustainable thanks to the innovative ABC process, which uses a thermoplastic adhesive instead of latex in the backcoating: Unlike latex, thermoplastic adhesives can be heated and melted down together with the carpet components made of pure PET at the end of the product life cycle, which facilitates recycling considerably. Furthermore, since the fibers of the thermoplastic mono-material are easier to open, carpet cut-outs can be reclaimed more easily, thereby reducing the consumption of natural resources as well as waste volumes and thus CO2 emissions. The environmental  performance of Autoneum’s needlepunch carpets, which already contain a high proportion of recycled PET, is thus further improved.

Moreover, backcoatings without latex improve the sustainability of carpets not only thanks to better recyclability at the end of the product life cycle. Since the application of the thermoplastic adhesive using the innovative ABC process consumes significantly less energy than the production of latexbased backcoatings and does not require any water at all, the environmental impact can already be minimized in the manufacturing process. Additionally, thermoplastic adhesives developed in-house by Autoneum will open up new possibilities in the future for adapting backcoatings to the individual needs of vehicle manufacturers in terms of their acoustic performance, stiffness and abrasion resistance.

Models from various customers in Europe and North America are already equipped with latex-free needlepunch carpets from Autoneum. In the near future, backcoatings with thermoplastic adhesives will also be used for Autoneum’s tufted carpets. Production of the new, even more sustainable generation of tufted carpets is scheduled to start in early 2022.

Marabu is one of the first ink manufacturers to achieve climate neutrality. All Marabu Business Units will, where possible, make a specific contribution to achieve the 17 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) with PROJECT GREEN and therefore participate in the Green Deal.

"We are safeguarding the future of the next generations and are proud that we have managed to be a climate neutral company from July 2021 with the Tamm and Bietigheim sites. All our products, whether printing inks or creative colours, are climate neutral, too," explains York Boeder, CEO Executive Committee. "Our so-called PROJECT GREEN combines all measures that are taking us on our journey to climate neutrality. Climate protection is a particular concern for us, to which we have made a binding commitment within the scope of an extensive sustainability strategy. In accordance with our Marabu Green Deal, we avoid and reduce emissions wherever possible, e. g. by using green electricity, energy-saving schemes, mobility concepts or environmentally friendly materials. We offset all unavoidable CO2 emissions by supporting internationally certified climate protection projects. We are continually implementing measures to improve our carbon footprint and update them annually to make their success measurable. We have therefore set ourselves the active goal of reducing our CO2 emissions by another 25 % by 2030."

For decades, Marabu has invested in the research and development of safe production processes, environmentally friendly products, and clean technologies with the aim of preserving the natural environment. Marabu has worked with Climate Partner to analyse all the CO2 emissions from the sites in Tamm and Bietigheim and determine its carbon footprint. Including all product-related factors such as raw materials and logistics, Marabu currently generates approx. 18,500 tons of unavoidable CO2 emissions. This value is the positive result of a number of climate-friendly measures pursued by Marabu, such as the early switch to green electricity in 2007.

Marabu's main activities to avoid and reduce CO2 emissions:

• Energy - Switching to green electricity from hydropower
• Mobility - Migration of the company's vehicles to electric and hybrid cars as well as in e-charging stations
• Production - Use of renewable energies and resource-efficient production processes
• Raw materials - Replacing critical substances with environmentally friendly alternatives for new and existing products
• Transporting - Climate-neutral freight carriers and lower-emission transport methods like shipping or road transport replace air freight wherever possible
• Product technology - Modern, low-emission products

• Fraunhofer, SABIC, and Procter & Gamble join forces
• The Fraunhofer Cluster of Excellence Circular Plastics Economy CCPE and its Institute for Environmental, Safety and Energy Technology UMSICHT have developed an advanced recycling process for used plastics.
• The pilot project with SABIC and Procter & Gamble serves to demonstrate the feasibility of closed-loop recycling for single-use facemasks.

Due to COVID-19, use of billions of disposable facemasks is raising environmental concerns especially when they are thoughtlessly discarded in public spaces, including - parks, open-air venues and beaches. Apart from the challenge of dealing with such huge volumes of essential personal healthcare items in a sustainable way, simply throwing the used masks away for disposal on landfill sites or in incineration plants represents a loss of valuable feedstock for new material.

“Recognizing the challenge, we set out to explore how used facemasks could potentially be returned into the value chain of new facemask production”, says Dr. Peter Dziezok, Director R&D Open Innovation at P&G. “But creating a true circular solution from both a sustainable and an economically feasible perspective takes partners. Therefore, we teamed up with Fraunhofer CCPE and Fraunhofer UMSICHT’s expert scientists and SABIC’s Technology & Innovation specialists to investigate potential solutions.”

As part of the pilot, P&G collected used facemasks worn by employees or given to visitors at its manufacturing and research sites in Germany. Although those masks are always disposed of responsibly, there was no ideal route in place to recycle them efficiently. To help demonstrate a potential step change in this scenario, special collection bins were set up, and the collected used masks were sent to Fraunhofer for further processing in a dedicated research pyrolysis plant.

“A single-use medical product such as a face mask has high hygiene requirements, both in terms of disposal and production. Mechanical recycling, would have not done the job”, explains Dr. Alexander Hofmann, Head of Department Recycling Management at Fraunhofer UMSICHT. “In our solution, therefore, the masks were first automatically shredded and then thermochemically converted to pyrolysis oil. Pyrolysis breaks the plastic down into molecular fragments under pressure and heat, which will also destroy any residual pollutants or pathogens, such as the Coronavirus. In this way it is possible to produce feedstock for new plastics in virgin quality that can also meet the requirements for medical products”, adds Hofmann, who is also Head of Research Department “Advanced Recycling” at Fraunhofer CCPE.

The pyrolysis oil was then sent to SABIC to be used as feedstock for the production of new PP resin. The resins were produced using the widely recognized principle of mass balance to combine the alternative feedstock with fossil-based feedstock in the production process. Mass balance is considered a crucial bridge between today’s large scale linear economy and the more sustainable circular economy of the future, which today is operated on a smaller scale but is expected to grow quickly.

“The high-quality circular PP polymer obtained in this pilot clearly demonstrates that closed-loop recycling is achievable through active collaboration of players from across the value chain”, emphasizes Mark Vester, Global Circular Economy Leader at SABIC. “The circular material is part of our TRUCIRCLE™ portfolio, aimed at preventing valuable used plastic from becoming waste and at mitigating the depletion of fossil resources.”

Finally, to close the loop, the PP polymer was supplied to P&G, where it was processed into non-woven fibers material. “This pilot project has helped us to assess if the close loop approach could work for hygienic and medical grade plastics”, says Hansjörg Reick, P&G Senior Director Open Innovation. “Of course, further work is needed but the results so far have been very encouraging.”

The entire closed loop pilot project from facemask collection to production was developed and implemented within seven months. The transferability of advanced recycling to other feedstocks and chemical products is being further researched at Fraunhofer CCPE.

• Guidelines of the EU Commission to implement the Single-Use Plastics Directive have been published
• Uniform labelling obligation for wipes and feminine hygiene products containing plastics as of July 03, 2021
• Lenzing’s wood-based, biodegradable VEOCEL™ branded fibers as a sustainable alternative to plastic

The Lenzing Group welcomes the issuance of the guidelines for the implementation of the Single-Use Plastics Directive (EU) 2019/904, which took effect on June 05, 2019¹. In these guidelines, the EU Commission specifies which products fall within the scope of the directive, thus providing clarity in the joint fight of the EU member states against environmental pollution from plastic waste. Lenzing’s wood-based, biodegradable cellulosic fibers such as those of the VEOCEL™ brand comprise a sustainable and innovative solution to this man-made problem.

Uniform labelling rules for some single-use plastic products
The Commission implementing regulation (EU) 2020/2151 applying to the Single-Use Plastics Directive stipulate uniform labelling requirements for some of the single-use plastic products on the packaging or the product itself starting on July 03, 2021. They encompass feminine hygiene products and wet wipes for personal and household care containing plastic.

Consumers want sustainable hygiene products
Even before the implementation of the Single-Use Plastics Directive, Lenzing already gives consumers clear guidance in their purchasing decisions. Products bearing the VEOCEL™ brand logo on their packaging are produced in line with stringent certification criteria. As a consequence, consumers can be assured that the products contain biodegradable, cellulosic materials.

A Marketagent survey carried out in German-speaking Europe in October 2019² concluded that nine out of ten consumers would immediately change their purchasing behavior for wipes if they found out that their current product contains plastic. This would seem to imply that new market dynamics will emerge once the labelling rules for single-use plastic products takes effect. According to a Smithers Report³, about 500,000 tons of petroleum-based fibers are used each year for the production of wipes.

¹ Directive (EU) 2019/904 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 5 June 2019 on the reduction of the impact of certain plastic products on the environment
² Representative Marketagent Online survey, n = 1,005 (14 - 69 years old, from Austria and Germany). https://itsinourhands.com/
³ Smithers Report “The Future of Global Nonwoven Wipes to 2023”, published in 2018, page 23, reference year 2018