Several products made by Asahi Kasei and a 75 per cent-owned subsidiary have acquired the widely recognised ISCC Plus sustainability certification. The list of newly certified products includes materials used in tyre production.
Asahi Kasei reports that, together with an affiliated company, it has acquired ISCC Plus sustainability certification for several products, including Asaprene solution polymerised SBR for applications such as tyre treads and casings.
Tyre makers have committed themselves to ambitious sustainability goals, and can only achieve these through the use of sustainable raw materials. We’re currently seeing a spate of new plans and projects in this sector, the latest being an agreement that Japan’s Asahi Kasei Corporation concluded with Shell Eastern Petroleum Ltd. yesterday for the supply of butadiene derived from plastic waste and biomass.
Growers, suppliers and manufacturers of both natural and synthetic rubbers are feeling the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, with demand for both commodities decreasing significantly in the first quarter of 2020.
Anyone who’s racked up a few miles in the tyre industry will be familiar with what some call the ‘magic triangle’ of performance – the relationship between wet traction and braking, rolling resistance and wear, and the role compounding plays in helping the protagonists live in harmony. But Trinseo considers this three-pointed model a relic. We recently spoke with Samer Al Jabi, global business director of Trinseo’s Synthetic Rubber business segment, to find out why.
Close customer proximity can provide measurable and also intangible benefits. Japanese chemical company Asahi Kasei aims to achieve both with its newly-established research and development presence in Europe. Tyres & Accessories recently visited the facility to find out more.
According to reports recently published by Research and Markets, the global solution styrene butadiene rubber (S-SBR) market is expected to reach US$5.40 billion by 2025, while the global polybutadiene market is expected to reach US$5.83 billion by that date.
In addition to showcasing its latest tyre industry developments at next month’s Tire Technology Expo in Hannover, Germany, the Tire and Specialty Rubbers (TSR) business unit of specialty chemicals company Lanxess will deliver two presentations on research into potential ways to further optimise tyre rubber compound.
Groundwork begins this month on a new 60,000 ton per annum S-SBR plant destined to supply synthetic rubber to tyre industry customers. Construction of the new plant begins in the first quarter of next year at the MOL Petrochemicals site in Tiszaújváros, Hungary and the facility is a 51/49 per cent joint venture between Japan’s JSR Corporation and Hungary’s MOL Group. It is expected that the plant’s mechanical completion will take place within 2017.
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