VTT creates research project to reduce carbon emissions in plastic manufacturing

20 Dec 2022 --- The Forest CUMP research project, coordinated by VTT, examines the capture and utilization of carbon dioxide from the forest industry and waste incineration in manufacturing different types of plastic products. Simultaneously, process concepts will be developed to enable the commercial utilization of carbon dioxide emissions in other industry fields

Carbon from industrial emissions of carbon dioxide can be bound in the products of the plastics and chemical industries. VTT looks to create possibilities for developing new, climate-friendly plastics and other polymeric products with fewer CO2 emissions. 

The Forest CUMP project, launched in August 2022, focuses on the carbon dioxide emissions of the forest industry and waste incineration. 

“We can utilize the results of the test plant in the development and design of an industrial-scale plant. In addition to technological development, we are studying the applicability of different sources of CO2 and methods for capture and purification of CO2,” says VTT research professor Juha Lehtonen.  

VTT founds The Forest CUMP Project to research how CO2 is extracted by waste incineration to make plastics. Reducing CO2
The project’s intended end-products would be polyolefins – PE and PP – present in many Finnish products and packaging. Today these materials are manufactured almost exclusively from fossil raw materials.

“We are also looking into the logistical angle linked with transporting and storing the feedstocks – carbon dioxide and hydrogen – and the intermediate products – hydrocarbon,” continues Lehtonen.

The project is being carried out in cooperation with company partners as part of Business Finland’s Veturi ecosystems, which promote sustainable development. One partner is Borealis, making Forest CUMP part of Borealis’ Sprit program, which aims at green transition in the plastics industry.

The Forest CUMP project aims at developing a processing concept that would enable the scaling of the technology up to the level of industrial production. An interim goal in the commercialization of the process is to build a small test plant in a selected industrial environment in 2024.

“This is a significant development project that supports our vision, in which the carbon dioxide emissions from industry could be utilized for the production of, e.g., durable plastic pipes out of them, which can bind carbon for long periods,” says Antti Ilves at Borealis. 

CUMP supersedes BECCU
The Forest CUMP project continues the work of the earlier BECCU project, which aimed at utilizing carbon dioxide in producing raw materials for polyurethane products such as insulation materials and industrial adhesives.

BECCU is a cooperative project between VTT, Business Finland and 13 stakeholders from various industries. Its target is to perform proof-of-concept for the integrated production of biopower and heat, transportation fuels and specialty chemicals based on using CO2 from biomass operations and hydrogen from water electrolysis or industrial processes. 

The project developed technologies and a process concept for an entire value chain from the bioenergy production, and the capture of carbon dioxide, to the production of chemicals and polymers. The Forest CUMP project is developing further the production technology of hydrocarbon intermediates generated in BECCU.

Becca’s primary goal is to create new business opportunities along the value chain, proving the ultimate novelty for producing fully CO2-based specialty chemicals such as polycarbonate and polyether polyols, as will not be done with the Forest CUMP project. 

Edited by Sabine Waldeck 

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