Covestro’s first ISCC Plus certified site in Asia Pacific
Drop-in solution for customers with constant product quality
First order to be delivered to electronics industry
Additional solar power secured for Shanghai site
Covestro has now received mass balancing certification according to Iscc Plus for its Shanghai site. This enables the company to offer its Asian customers large quantities of the high-performance plastic polycarbonate and the polyurethane raw material MDI from alternative sources.
Covestro has now received Iscc Plus mass balance certification for its site in Shanghai, known as Covestro Integrated Site of Shanghai (Ciss). This means the company can now offer its customers in the Asia Pacific region large volumes of the high-performance plastic polycarbonate as well as the polyurethane raw material methylene diphenyl diisocyanate (MDI), made from alternative raw materials in the same good quality as fossil-based counterparts.
Ciss, the company’s biggest site worldwide, is the first Covestro site in the Asia Pacific region to have received the Iscc Plus certification, following in the footsteps of the two European sites Antwerp in Belgium and Uerdingen, Germany, at the end of last year. In the meantime, two local trading entities, Covestro (Shanghai) Investment Co., Ltd. and Covestro (Hong Kong) Ltd., have also been Iscc Plus certified.
This means that certified mass-balanced products can now be delivered seamlessly from Covestro’s production and trading units to downstream industries. The company will start delivering the first order for certified mass-balanced polycarbonates of the Makrolon RE range to the electronics industry in September.
“It makes me proud that we’ve taken a big step forward towards our vision to be fully circular in order to meet the demand for more sustainable products,” says Sucheta Govil, Chief Commercial Officer at Covestro. “With the mass balance certification, we are now able to directly support our customers in Asia Pacific to reduce carbon footprint with a drop-in solution that can be implemented in existing production processes without the need for technical modification.”
Mass balanced products from Covestro with attributed alternative content have significantly lower CO₂ footprint compared to fossil-based alternatives while enjoying the same good quality and properties. Mass-balanced Makrolon RE, for example, offers superior climate performance with up to 80 percent reduction in carbon footprint compared to standard virgin material already today. Covestro plans to make selected Makrolon RE polycarbonates climate neutral by the use of renewable energy at its European sites by the end of this year, to be followed by other regions.
Covestro is gradually converting to alternative raw material sources including renewables as part of a comprehensive program to drive forward the transition to a Circular Economy. The certification of the polycarbonate as well as the intermediate product MDI strengthens the use of alternative raw materials at Covestro. Polycarbonate is used in high-quality applications in the automotive and electronics industries, among others. MDI is used to produce rigid polyurethane foam, which has been providing efficient thermal insulation for refrigeration appliances and buildings for decades.
Iscc (“International Sustainability and Carbon Certification”) is an internationally recognized system for the sustainability certification of biomass and bioenergy. The standard applies to all stages of the value chain and is recognized worldwide.
For more details: www.iscc-system.org
