The new Additives R&D Center will foster agile collaboration with customers at every step of the value chain.
Closer to Chinese customers from the start. Clariant’s Additives business continues to step up support for the needs of China’s growth industries, with new top-class facilities to foster R&D and joint application technology developments at the One Clariant Campus (OCC). Ahead of Chinaplas 2021, Clariant shares a taster of bio-based additives available to advance resource-efficient innovation in local market segments, highlights from its new sustainable solutions set for their regional debut.
The new Additives’ R&D Center will be integrated in the new Clariant Innovation Center China in Shanghai. It aims to bring faster lead times and more speed in development efforts for various application sectors including E&E, 5G, automotive, packaging, fibres & films, adhesives, coatings and inks.
Supplementing Clariant’s additives’ production facilities in China, the R&D Center will offer customers unique, from-the-ground-up opportunities for joint development and application testing, at every step of the value chain. From polymerization to compounding and conversion, all the way to performance testing.
Francois Bleger, Head of Clariant Additives business, comments: “Demand for high-end additives is growing strongly in China. As local manufacturers develop more sophisticated processes, technologies and products to align with market needs and China’s environmental goals, sustainable additives can be key to boosting progress effectively and efficiently. Our new Additives R&D Center creates the exciting opportunity to be more agile in our additive development and foster China-relevant innovation together, from the start of the creative process. In a nutshell, innovation for customers, with customers, at the heart of the main markets.”
Located right in the main markets for Polyamide (PA), Polyester (PET) fibres, engineering thermoplastics & thermosets, and increasingly biopolymers, the new facility will feature a state-of-the-art plastics processing and testing laboratory equipped with related technologies such as for polycondensation, compounding, spinning, injection molding and foaming, and establish a broad range of relevant testing and analytical capabilities.
To support local manufacturers, Clariant has successfully introduced solutions from its AddWorks® PKG series in China to further improve the inherent properties of polyolefins for the packaging of highly demanding new applications. This includes AddWorks PKG 113, designed for high speed Cast Polypropylene (CPP) and Biaxially Oriented Polypropylene (BOPP) resins providing excellent polymer melt protection and high film productivity, and AddWorks PKG 171 designed for vis-broken PP and for low discoloration PP applications. Both products will feature at Chinaplas 2021 alongside more new sustainable additive solutions for key market segments.
For example, China’s ban on single use plastics will increase the country’s focus on recyclable plastics and bioplastics and promote the shift to a circular economy for plastics. At Chinaplas 2021, Clariant will introduce several new additives to the region from its EcoCircle initiative to support manufacturers in achieving these goals.
EcoCircle supports the transition from a one-way plastics value chain to a circular plastics economy by going beyond a simple product focus, looking at the entire value chain, and identifying the most sustainable and viable solutions. This includes the development of sustainable solutions for mechanical recycling and the use of certified renewable raw materials to produce high-performance additives. Qualifying products carry a designator based on their mass-balance or real renewable carbon content to help manufacturers identify products with key advantages. Among others, this includes Terra for products with a high renewable content, minumum 50 percent Renewable Carbon Index (RCI) based on mass balance certification or real renewable content; and VITA for products from natural origin with at least 98 percent RCI real renewable content.
New for the Chinese market is the Exolit® OP Terra range, renewable-based halogen-free flame retardants. A like-for-like drop in alternative to Clariant’s fossil based Exolit OP products, they achieve UL 94 V-0 rating with stable flame retardancy even after multiple recycling processes. Application areas include electronic and electrical equipment, and automotive components.
Licocare® RBW VITA will also be presented to customers in China for the first time. Clariant’s fully sustainable; practically 100 percent renewable, non-food competing bio-additives solutions offer multiple processing and end-product enhancements to biopolymers, such as Polylactic Acid (PLA). And in doing so, Licocare RBW VITA opens up opportunities for brands to consider biopolymers as a viable, low carbon footprint alternative to fossil based-plastics. Clariant also introduces Licocare RBW 330 VITA, a new renewable-based solution that nucleates polyamides, reducing the cooling time and shrink/warp, yielding faster cycles, and leading to better molding costs.
