NUREMBERG, Germany—Dow Chemical Co. has unveiled a sustainable "plant-based" EPDM rubber, created "with bio residues from other industries as raw material."
Launched during the German rubber expo DKT 2024 on July 3, Dow claim's its Nordel Ren EPDM will help customers lower their carbon footprints.
Initially applied to automotive weather seals and hoses, EPDM solutions also go into building profiles, roofing membranes, and wire and cable. Therefore, Dow said, the new bio-based EPDM will enable decarbonization of the building and construction industry and the automotive sector.
The material, according to the supplier, offers "identical performance to virgin materials with no requalification required."
Furthermore, the elastomer is produced through a "unique advanced molecular catalyst" process which, according to Dow, requires 24 percent less energy than the conventional Ziegler-Natta process.
AMC technology typically refers to the use of highly specialized and engineered catalysts at the molecular level to facilitate specific chemical reactions.
According to Dow, the EPDM is manufactured by using waste residues or by-products that do not require extra land resources or compete with the food chain.
In a statement to European Rubber Journal, Dow said it had "diverse options" in terms of bio-feedstock, naming cooking oil as one example.
The bio-EPDM is part of Dow's commitment to deliver 3 million metric tons per year of circular and renewable solutions by 2030, according to Zshelyz Lee, global automotive plastics circularity team leader.
Dow showcased its new bio-EPDM alongside a range of samples from its portfolio, including:
- Silastic solutions for electric vehicles, including high consistency rubbers (HCR) and liquid silicone rubbers (LSR) for fire protection and connectivity, advancing electrification of the automotive industry to reduce tailpipe emissions;
- Silastic silicone for self-sealing tires, designed to form a self-sealing layer on the inner surface of a tire, allowing long-distance driving without loss of air pressure and supporting easy disassembly of vehicle part for separate recycling of silicone;
- Nordel EPDM innovation for microdense weatherseals, aiding in the reduction of overall density of weatherseals and of tailpipe emissions through lightweighting, by bringing enough strength to maintain critical performance of the rubber material; and
- Dow’s patented innovation for the creation of Luxsense silicone synthetic leather, the world’s first silicone-based luxury synthetic material, bringing sustainability with lower carbon emissions cradle to gate, solvent-free fabrication process, and animal-free, while offering haptic feedback and abrasion resistance.
