“We provide materials that help to facilitate a more climate-neutral and circular world. The products to be manufactured at our new plant in Shanghai are an excellent illustration of this, as they will assist our customers in meeting the increasing demand for renewable energy solutions,” says Sucheta Govil, Chief Commercial Officer at ����AV. “In doing so, we are supporting the growth of an industry that is vital for preserving our climate. Furthermore, we are promoting sustainability in various industries by supplying materials containing renewable attributes.”

The polyurethane elastomers systems produced in the site can be used for a variety of end products. For offshore windpower, the protection of subsea cables is a core application area. The material is also used in the manufacturing process of photovoltaic panels or in screening medias in the mining industry. In all of the above, it is designed for purpose in close collaboration with customers to withstand even the harshest of conditions thanks to its excellent wear, tear and abrasion resistance.

“We want to support the growth of our customers and partake in the growth of key industries. As we expect the Elastomers market to grow above China’s gross domestic product, we want to enable our customers to capture it. That is what we do with our overall investments into our Elastomer business, and with this investment in our new plant in Shanghai right now,” said Dr. Thomas Braig, Head of the Business Entity Elastomers.

The new plant is the latest addition to the ����AV Integrated Site Shanghai (CISS), ����AV’s single largest production site worldwide. CISS is now home to twelve plants. Since 2001, the company has invested about 3.7 billion Euro into the site as of the end of 2022.

Holly Lei, President of ����AV in China, said, “Our company’s vision of becoming fully circular and our target of being operationally climate neutral by 2035 are perfectly aligned with China’s ambitions to be carbon neutral before 2060. The products we produce in CISS and this addition of polyurethane elastomers systems position us to make meaningful contributions to sustainability efforts in China and in the entire region, for example in the area of renewable energy generation.”

CISS is also among ����AV’s ISCC PLUS (International Sustainability and Carbon Certification) certified sites. This means it is capable of supplying customers with drop-in, derived from renewable attributed products, thereby helping customers to reduce their carbon footprint. To make more sustainable products easier to distinguish, ����AV introduced the suffix “CQ”. CQ stands for “Circular Intelligence” and identifies products containing a minimum of 25 percent alternative raw materials.

In addition to its extensive polycarbonate portfolio, the company now has more than double the plastic finishing capacity there than before and offers improved customer service. The project is also in line with the Indian government's "Make in India" initiative, which aims to encourage investment in the development and manufacture of products in India.

Dr. Nicolas Stoeckel, Head of Operations in the Engineering Plastics segment, said, "We have invested in compounding capacity from Germany to China to India to further improve our competitiveness and customer focus. With the recent expansion in Greater Noida – a key component of our Engineering Plastics Business Entity's global footprint – we continue to build capacity to better serve our customers in the region."

Congratulating the team on reaching this milestone, Anand Srinivasan, Managing Director of ����AV (India) Pvt. Ltd. said, "This investment in new production technology reflects our growth as a company and is further evidence of our commitment to provide continuous and flexible supply to our customers. We continue to work closely with them by anticipating their needs, monitoring market trends and maintaining a local presence. I want to thank our team for their dedication in achieving this important milestone."

In Greater Noida, ����AV has addressed capacity bottlenecks several times in the past, so that in 2017 the site was able to meet about 50 percent of domestic demand for compounded polycarbonate, while the other half was supplied from the Map Ta Phut site in Thailand. Then, in the same year, the decision was made to expand compounding at the Indian plant. Thanks to good teamwork, it was implemented as planned despite obstacles such as intermittent high levels of air pollution and the Covid 19 pandemic.

It is also ����AV's first project worldwide under its Blue Print concept for compounding. This involves largely standardizing the design of ����AV's compounding lines, enabling the company to build new lines faster and more cost-effectively in the future.