Skip to main content
Sister Publication Links
  • Middle East Foam & Polyurethane
  • UTECH Asia/PU China
  • UTECH Europe
  • UTECH Las Americas
Subscribe
  • My Account
  • Login
  • Subscribe
  • Ukraine
  • News
    • Asia
    • Americas
    • Europe
    • M & A
    • Financial results
    • Automotive
  • Data
  • Information
    • Country Overview
    • Market Sector overviews
    • Technical articles
    • Company profiles and strategies
  • Events
    • Exhibitions
    • Conferences
    • Webinars / Livestreams
    • Become a Speaker
    • UTECH Europe 2021
  • Advertise
  • Contact Us
  • Issues
  • Subscribe
MENU
Breadcrumb
  1. Home
  2. Information
September 29, 2014 11:00 PM

Finding a sustainable solution to flexible polyurethane waste

Simon Robinson
  • Tweet
  • Share
  • Share
  • Email
  • More
    Print

    The EuroPUR AGM in Vienna this summer featured a sustainability panel made up of Frank Grunert from Bayer MaterialScience, Bart Ten Brink of FoamPartner, Ferdinand Kleppmann from the Confederation of European Waste-to-Energy Plants of (CEWEP), IKEA’s Peter Moller and Jean-Pierre De Kesel of Recticel.

    By Simon Robinson

    What are we going to do with waste flexible polyurethane foam? This question is becoming increasingly important within the EU as legislation will remove high calorific value items such as mattresses from the landfill waste stream in the coming years.

    The EuroPUR summer meeting in Vienna in June, 2014 saw a round table of industry representatives from raw material producers though to foamers, furniture makers and waste management companies discuss some of the options,as well as the industry and environmental concerns around this area.

    This is a summary of that discussion:

    Frank Grunert, regional head polyurethanes Europe, Middle East, Africa and Latin America at Bayer MaterialScience, said: “It is important for the industry and regulators to take a holistic approach to sustainability.

    “This is because, in practice, companies and institutions only have expertise in specific areas. This makes it “necessary to build coalitions of partners to develop robust solutions.”

    Grunert’s point was amplified by Jean-Pierre De Kesel, chief sustainability officer at Recticel. He said that “to have a balanced discussion with authorities, the industry has to show its will and commitment to find solutions and at the same time it has to explain what the issues are from the industry side.”

    Reflecting, Grunert’s point, Peter Moller of Ikea, sustainability leader bed & bathroom at IKEA,, a major furniture specifier, designer and retailer said: “In several areas, IKEA is not the expert and we partner up with suppliers and external companies.”

    Grunert added that Bayer and a number of other big companies in the chemical industry have started the initiative Together For Sustainability, which he describes as a chemical initiative for sustainable supply chains that supports the principles of the United Nations Global Compact and Responsible Care.

    Jean-Pierre De Kesel gave an example of how Recticel was working with the mattress industry in Belgium to find the real numbers behind recycling. He said “Recticel, along with the Belgian mattress industry, will fund a study to compare the economic and environmental impact of take back systems and dismantling/recycling solutions for mattresses. This could lead to a better understanding of the recycling problematic for mattresses both for industry and for authorities, he added.

    Setting the tone for the debate he added: “The PU industry promotes thinking in life cycles and strongly supports projects to further reduce the environmental impact of its products.”

    Sustainable products

    Moller said: “We will make more sustainable products and solutions affordable, widely available and exciting.”

    However, he pointed out the intrinsic difficulty of doing so with polyurethane foams.: “For IKEA, foam is a material of specific challenges as it is traditionally produced by crude-oil based raw materials and difficult to recycle,” he said

    For Bart Ten Brink of FoamPartner, this difficulty can make the task seem to be “almost overwhelming.” Ten Brink also stressed the need for cooperation amongst the different stakeholder groups in flexible polyurethane foam and for making a start on closing the sustainability circles: “The industry may feel it is only taking small steps but it is important to take them rather than dream of the complete solution,” said Ten Brink.

    “Big changes always start with small steps at first,” he added. “The sum of many small steps can easily lead to the same big end result,” he added.

    Moller suggested that furniture retailers can help with sustainability. He said it is IKEA’s aim to “improve the sustainability profile of foam and to use foam in products where the properties are best utilised.”

    Moller continued: “IKEA does not only work with how it should be used in the final product but also the raw materials sourcing, where it is produced and how to handle the product’s end-of-life.

    He said IKEA is uniquely positioned in a unique integrated value chain where “we design, manufacture, transport and sell the goods.

    “This enables us to approach sustainability from several different parts of the chain, from raw materials to product design and to its end-of life,” he added.

    Ten Brink agreed and added: “Recycling has to be incorporated into product design.”

    Moller said: “This enables us to have a positive influence on the entire process and ultimately, that means lower prices and more sustainable products.”

    Recycling polyurethane products back into reusable materials does have a number of difficulties. The technical issues include: how to convert polyurethane into polyols of sufficiently high quality to meet current environmental standards.

    Overcoming difficulties

    Some problems are logistical, such as how can flexible polyurethane be made dense enough to be cost-effectively transported to recycling stations for example.

    According to Ten Brink, “the circular economy will be a fact of life in the future, we have to find ways to ensure that effective, efficient recycling is possible.”

    “Manufacturing and recycling must be both energy and resource efficient,” he added.

    Grunert said: “Of course, polyurethanes can be recycled. The polyurethane industry has developed a bunch of technically feasible solutions for the recycling of all types of PU that exist. But, which is best for the individual needs of society will have to be considered case by case in order to identify the best regional, ecological and economic solutions.”

    But Ferdinand Kleppmann, of CEWEP, said: “Recycling is not an end in itself, but must fulfil a useful purpose on the market.”

    “At the end of the service life of polyurethanes, there are different waste management options which need to be balanced in each case, to find out the best ecological and economic solution,” said Grunert

    “In the future, post-consumer scrap and mattresses recycling will be important but it’s not an easy conundrum to solve,” said Ten Brink.

    Ten Brink explained how his company is involved: “Today, FoamPartner is involved in mechanical recycling and foam rebonding as its primary recycling processes. In the future, this may be complemented by chemical recycling such as acidolysis,” he said,

    FoamPartner is currently involved in waste reduction in the foaming process and in the future this will be complemented by supporting development programmes for sustainable polyols,” added Ten Brink.

    In terms of resource efficiency, FoamPartner believes combustion technology can be used for flexible foam incineration with energy recovery.

    In the future, the company aims to develop products that will “save energy and filter air and water as part of its enhanced development process,” said Ten Brink.

    Processing polyurethane at the end of life of components must make financial as well as ecological sense, the panel agreed.

    “Sustainability means more than recycling materials at all costs,” said Grunert. He added: “It is important to understand the energy, economic and social costs of sustainability at all stages of the circular economy.”

    “To be truly sustainable,” he argued, “the whole process should allow all of the participants to at least break even or make a profit for reinvestment. This is not perpetual motion, it is ensuring that the true costs of production, ownership and reuse are correctly reflected.”

    Power Generation

    Kleppmann said: “Polyurethane foam can contribute to the generation of energy and generating energy from some polyurethane waste could improve the quality of polyurethane recyclate.”

    Waste to Energy helps reach the targets set in the EU Landfill Directive that aim to reduce the amount of biodegradable waste being landfilled, added Kleppmann,

    According to Eurostat, said Kleppmann, more than 82m/T of municipal solid waste (MSW) (34% of MSW treated in EU28) was sent to landfills in 2012. To minimise the amount of waste landfilled, waste to energy (WtE) and recycling work as complementary treatment methods.

    “In fact, those member states that have practically eliminated landfilling (Austria, Belgium, Germany, Denmark, Netherlands and Sweden) achieved this by introducing landfill bans. At the same time, they have high recycling rates,” he stated.

    Kleppmann also said: “The remaining waste that cannot be recycled in a sustainable or economically viable way is turned into energy and contributes to the security of energy supply by making affordable, reliable and secure energy [available],”

    “WtE helps quality recycling “as it takes the waste that is not good enough for quality recycling and reduces the volume of pollutants to enter the value chain,” Kleppmann added.

    What does recycling mean? 

    However, Kleppmann warned that it can be unclear what is meant by recycling. Because of this, he said, there is no good data on what goes into a recycling plant and what goes out to non-EU countries, and what is finally replacing virgin materials on the markets.

    “To measure recycling efforts properly we need to harmonise monitoring and there are currently four different options of how to do this within the EU-28,” he added.

    De Kesel agreed: “There is no real Europe-wide recycling policy and his is leading to problems. France’s position, which is not well thought out, makes other European countries think it is a good idea to install take back systems for mattresses and something similar should be implemented by them. This is causing confusion and problems amongst foam makers and mattress producers."

    At FoamPartner, said Ten Brink, “sustainability means balancing economic progress and profitable growth with ecological and social responsibility.”

    Grunert said: “These processes have to be carried out in a way which is fair to all of the stakeholders. This means that in Europe, the overarching EU legislation and regulation should be implemented in compatible ways by each of the member states..

    “It is important that any regulations introduced by the European Union do not close off possible future lines for recycling or reuse or recovery,” Grunert added,

    Moller added: “At IKEA, we are guided by our vision of creating a better everyday life for the people. We believe that sustainability should not be a luxury that few can afford or that people should have to choose between design, function, quality, low price or sustainability.”

    De Kesel added: “Our industry should continue to sell the long life and high quality of our products to consumers and authorities, Materials that need to be replaced more frequently will require more resources and this also has a high impact on sustainability.”

     

     

    Recommended for You
    2022, Alesund, original, Norway, Laader Berg
    From Norway to the world
    2022, iStock, Machinery, cogs, 800.jpeg
    Machinery survey 2021: Room for improvement
    Econic raises funds aims for commercialisation in 2023
    Econic raises funds aims for commercialisation in 2023
    Latest Issue
    April/May 2022 issue
    Click HERE for Free Download
    View All Archives
    Get our newsletters

    Breaking news and in-depth coverage of essential topics delivered straight to your inbox.

    Subscribe today

    Register to access our archive of leading information on the polyurethanes industry.

    Subscribe now
    Connect with Us
    • Twitter
    • LinkedIn
    • Facebook
    • Youtube

    Follow us on social media for the latest polyurethanes industry news and event updates.

    Logo
    Contact Us

    Crain Communications
    11, Ironmonger Lane
    London
    EC2V 8EY
    United Kingdom

    Editorial
    Phone +44 (0) 20 3287 5935
    Email click to send

    Customer Service
    Phone +1 313 446 0450
    Email click to send

    Resources
    • Advertise with Us
    • Media Kit
    • Staff
    • Careers
    • Ad Choices Ad Choices
    • Sitemap
    Legal
    • Terms and Conditions
    • Privacy Policy
    • Privacy Request
    Copyright © 1996-2022. Crain Communications, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
    • Ukraine
    • News
      • Asia
      • Americas
      • Europe
      • M & A
      • Financial results
      • Automotive
    • Data
    • Information
      • Country Overview
      • Market Sector overviews
      • Technical articles
      • Company profiles and strategies
    • Events
      • Exhibitions
      • Conferences
      • Webinars / Livestreams
      • Become a Speaker
      • UTECH Europe 2021
    • Advertise
    • Contact Us
    • Issues
    • Subscribe