May 2022

Powder coating has long been the green process of choice for finishing operations. It produces less waste than alternative finishing processes such as liquid coating, and overspray is often able to be reclaimed and reused.

Goodyear has announced that its Metro Miler G152 and G652 tires will now utilize fewer petroleum-based materials. Aiming to fully replace petroleum-derived oils by 2040, the tire maker has replaced some of the petroleum-based materials in its Metro Miler city transit tires for the first time. The tires now use a bio-based soybean oil compound made from a readily available surplus of soybean oil from the food industry.

There is nothing circular about compostable packaging, according to one expert on sustainability. In fact, biodegradable plastics ultimately add to greenhouse gas emissions.

Eight variations of a sustainable theme for refillable packaging range from reusable PET bottles of soap at Walmart to refillable bags for kibble at Petco.

Bridgestone Americas (Bridgestone) has formed an exclusive partnership with LanzaTech NZ (LanzaTech), a carbon capture and transformation (CCT) company, to address end-of-life tire waste. Under the partnership the duo will co-develop the first dedicated end-of-life tire recycling process by using LanzaTech’s own CCT technology, with the aim of creating a pathway toward tire material circularity and to decarbonize new tire production processes.

The top winner in this year’s Dow awards, a standup pouch from Australia, combines the benefits of high-barrier food packaging with curbside recyclability.

Solvay and Carbios demonstrate that the unique technology can close the loop for PET/PVDC barrier films.

Specialty chemicals company Orion Engineered Carbons has announced it aims to align company sustainability objectives with the Paris Climate Agreement and seeks to achieve net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. The net-zero ambition comes as part of the chemical company’s ongoing commitment to address global climate change while continuing to meet customer demand for highly engineered materials essential for tires and other products.

In its March 2022 monthly rubber statistics publication released today, the department said on a year-on-year comparison, NR production also slid by 22.3 per cent compared to 36,068 tonnes in March 2021.

In Malaysia, festivals often witness a sharp rise in the generation of domestic waste. Fears are not baseless as Malaysia ranks second in Asia for annual per capita plastic use.

It is an open secret that prices of glove stocks on Bursa Malaysia have slumped substantially since the beginning 2H 2021. This comes about as manufacturers from the Big-Four glove makers to other smaller producers are grappling with normalising average selling prices (ASPs) which is inching closer to their pre-pandemic levels amid an increasingly competitive operating landscape.

Mitsui O.S.K. Lines Ltd. has said it aims to start a new project as early as the summer of next year that involves collecting plastic waste by ship in the sea off Vietnam, one of the world’s major producers of marine plastic trash.

Malaysia is intensifying its efforts to boost demand for palm oil and rubber, and is ready to meet the encouraging demand for the commodities. The Malaysian Palm Oil Board anticipates crude palm oil production to improve by 4.9 per cent to 19 million tonnes this year, from 18.12 million tonnes in 2021.

From 2026 supermarkets and stores in shopping malls will not be allowed to pack goods in single-use plastic bags, an environment ministry official has said.

Indonesia may delay plans to impose an excise tax on plastic and sweetened beverages to 2023, the finance ministry’s director general of customs and excise, Askolani, said on Wednesday.