Page 33 - Platics News June 2022

FEATURE

for polypropylene ones, leaving no documentation and there’s a ton opment of new standards for poly-
microplastics behind. of science that sits behind this as mer analysis, eco-toxicity and bio-
Established in 2015 Polymateria, you’d imagine coming from Impe- degradability testing. e new BSI
rial College, London. But the reason PAS 9017 addresses a signi cant gap
has created a new technology which
is self-destructing plastic. “What’s we’re doing this is to create ‘seeing- in the plastics landscape to ensure
is-believing’ moments. Particularly claims about biodegradability can be
unique about it is that it’s time con-
trived, so one can program it when young people, they don’t really want independently veri ed without caus-
to read lots of technical information, ing any harm to the environment.
the plastic is being made and its exact
usefulness, so that’s a date by which they just want to know if something is is the rst standard for measur-
works. One of the ways we’re engag- ing the biodegradability of polyole-
the technology becomes active, and
it starts the process of return to na- ing them is by showing them the two ns, the most littered form of plastic
key features of the technology by ex- packaging.
ture,” says Niall. at’s really use-
ful for allows one to communicate periences. Recently, the startup also struck
clearly to consumers that you want is Living Lab is a way we show a deal with a supplier to 7-Eleven
them to use it, you want them to re- what the product looks like and how stores, South Plastic Industry Co, in
use it, maybe recycle it and you can people use it and enjoy it, and then Taiwan and also inked a deal of up to
build in enough time for all of those we put it in there. Because we know $100 million to license its technol-
things to happen. One can program that it can biodegrade in 336 days, ogy to Formosa Plastics Corp, one

that in when you make it and once we’ll lm that. ere’s one going to of the world’s biggest petrochemical
the time is o , if it’s in the natural go to Chennai and it’s going to be manufacturers.
environment as 32% of all plastic managed by independent scientists e company has been working with
is (that’s about 4 billion tonnes), it who will record everything that hap- Clariant (now called Avient after the
will return to nature. We’ve managed pens. We’ve done one in Dakar and merger with Poly One) in India for
to get it falling back to nature in we’re going to do one in Brazil later several years and have been our kind
336 days without microplastic and this year. is is how we bring sci- of technical partners throughout
without harming the environment. ence to life on the biodegradation the last couple of years says Niall .
So that’s unique because previously side. On the recycling side, we then And it’s quite exciting because what
technologies were fracturing plastic show people that if they do the right it o ers is an end-to-end solution.
which was not fully biodegradable.” thing, we can collect some of these A kind of a true Made in India sce-
cups and upcycle them and turn
Living Lab at Polymateria nario, so the ability to manufacture
them into cool products like brace-
Polymateria has developed what it here, prototype here as well as devel-
lets. op and test in India. We are testing at
calls as Living Lab. Neill explains ,
We’ve launched new standards, we’ve New BSI Standards eight di erent facilities in India from
pushed out a lot of peer-reviewed Polymateria has supported the devel- Chennai to CIPET.

33 PLASTICS NEWS June 2022