Europeans add renewables to the raw material mix

More European chemical companies are adding biobased or renewable feedstocks to those derived from fossil fuels in a bid to reduce their carbon footprints. Borealis, Ineos, and Perstorp all recently announced they are making products using the so-called mass-balance approach. Other firms involved in mass-balance production include BASF, Covestro, and Neste.

In mass-balance production, fossil and renewable hydrocarbon raw materials are mixed together. No resulting products are made solely from renewable raw materials; instead, companies assign the renewable content to a portion of their output.

Borealis claims it is making the world’s first cross-linked polyethylene pipes derived from waste pulp and food residues via a mass-balance approach. The pipes have a carbon footprint up to 90% lower than those made from fossil fuels, the Austrian firm says.

Ineos has launched mass-balance phenol, acetone, and alphamethylstyrene. The firm will make the products in Gladbeck, Germany, and Antwerp, Belgium, from a blend of renewable, recycled, and fossil-fuel derived cumene. Perstorp’s mass-balance approach involves making 2-ethylhexanol, a plasticizer and diesel fuel enhancer, with 25% renewable or recycled raw material.

“Generally, it makes sense to try and take in recycled or bio-material,” says Agnieszka Brandt-Talbot, a chemistry lecturer at Imperial College London. But she says mass-balance producers should pair the approach with life cycle analysis to ensure the inputs have a benign impact on the environment.

ISCC, a German organization that audits companies’ mass-balance processes, says it has now certified thousands of production sites across a range of industries.