Building a supply chain for biomass plastics
What is biomass plastic?
Many of the plastics around us are made from fossil fuels. Idemitsu Kosan is working on the production and supply of "biomass plastic" as one of the measures to achieve carbon neutrality in 2050.
Biomass plastic is a plastic manufactured using organic Resources such as plants that absorb CO₂ from the atmosphere. Since it is made from organic Resources, it is possible to reduce CO₂ emissions during manufacturing compared to plastics made from petroleum-derived naphtha.
Our company procures "biomass naphtha" produced from plants and other sources, and also manufactures and supplies biomass chemicals such as biomass styrene monomer and biomass paraxylene. We are also aiming for in-house production of biomass naphtha and biomass ethylene in the future.
What is ISCC PLUS certification?
ISCC PLUS certification, developed by ISCC *, is an international system that manages and guarantees the supply chain of products using sustainable raw materials such as biomass. This is an effective certification system based on the mass balance method, which promotes biomass in the supply chain of the chemical industry, which has particularly complex production processes.
In addition to our Chiba Complex and Tokuyama Complex, we have also obtained ISCC PLUS certification at Idemitsu SM (Malaysia) and Petrochemicals (Malaysia) in Malaysia.
*ISCC: International Sustainability and Carbon Certification
What is mass balance method?
In the processing and distribution process from raw materials to products, when raw materials with certain characteristics (e.g. biomass-derived raw materials) are mixed with raw materials other than those (e.g. petroleum-derived raw materials), raw materials with those characteristics This is a method of assigning characteristics to a part of a product depending on the amount of input. In the chemical industry, where products go through multiple production processes, the mass balance method is considered an effective means of promoting biomass in the supply chain.
Collaboration with SAF (sustainable aviation fuel) production
Our goal is to build a domestic production system for SAF (Sustainable Aviation Fuel) of 500,000 KL per year by 2030. One of our SAF production methods uses bioethanol called ATJ (Alcohol To Jet) as a raw material. During the SAF production process by ATJ, biomass naphtha and biomass ethylene are produced as by-products. We aim to manufacture biomass plastic using these raw materials.
