Mass balance and bio-based raw materials in coatings

How feasible is the mass balance principle to become more sustainable?

Lars Ossenschmidt: The mass balance principle enables the integration of renewable or recycled raw materials into existing production processes. Existing efficient lines are utilised, which avoids high investments in new infrastructure. In most cases, the raw materials obtained using mass balance are chemically identical to the corresponding fossil-based raw materials, which also leads to identical properties in the products. This means that fossil-based raw materials can be gradually replaced by more sustainable alternatives without any fluctuations in quality and without having to immediately reorganise the entire production process.
At the same time, we see some challenges in the use of mass balance raw materials.
There are certifications that enable transparent traceability of the use of such raw materials, but the raw material cannot be physically traced. The acceptance of such raw materials varies depending on the in-dustry. For example, there are customers or countries in the architectural paints and coatings sector in Europe that prefer segregated renewable raw materials and want to prove this in part using the C-14 radiocarbon method.
Mass-balance raw materials usually offer identical properties, i.e. the possibility of creating new innovative material properties cannot be utilised. This is where novel renewable raw materials have an advantage; in addition to the concrete evidence of bi-ogenic carbon, they can also offer added value through their property profile.
We develop and produce products for various industries and regions. In doing so, we take customer requirements into account and endeavour to use the available sustainable raw materials as profitably as possible. We use both mass-balanced and segregated renewable raw materials for this purpose.

What are your expectations in terms of innovation, growth and market share in the bio-based coatings sector over the next five years?

Ossenschmidt: We are pursuing an ambitious sustaina bility strategy throughout the company By 2030, we want to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions to such an extent that we are climate-neutral in Scope 1 and 2. We have already taken several important steps in this direction or have made preparations to do so.
We also want to reduce Scope 3 emissions, i.e. those relating to our products them-selves, as quickly as possible so that we can become climate neutral here too.
This sustainability strategy naturally has an impact on all areas of the company. At product development level, there are already no developments that do not contribute to the sustainability strategy in some way. The use of bio-based raw materials has always been a central aspect for us. We started out as a natural resin refiner, established ourselves through our highly bio-based alkyd resins and can now cover almost all polymer technologies relevant to coating materials. The use of bio-based raw materials in our products is steadily increasing with the successful realisation of our projects. Our target for the coming years is more than 50%.
At the same time, bio-based raw materials also pose a number of challenges. Ideally, the raw materials should not conflict with food production. There are various approaches to processing by-products,
cultivating unused arable land or growing food and industrial crops at the same time. On the other hand, the market launch and scaling of such raw materials is slower, which can lead to poorer availability and higher prices For us as a medium-sized company, the opportunities with bio-based raw materials clearly outweigh the risks. We want to differentiate ourselves from our competitors and try to establish our product ideas. Renewable raw materials play a special role here.

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