Biodegradable plastics innovation has a clear front-runner with the sharp spike in global patent applications for butylene-based biopolymers, according to the latest report.
a marked increase in companies filing patents for chemical recycling of polymers heralds a huge turnaround in this area of green innovation.
The second annual edition of the Inside Green Innovation: Progress Report 2022, from leading intellectual property firm Appleyard Lees, analyses patent filings across several key environmental issues facing the world, including biopolymers and polymer recycling.
Since 2018, the start of an upsurge in innovations for butylene-based polymers, activity among the top five organisations filing patents more than doubled (from 26 to 56 in 2020), with the 2020 number an increase of more than 200% on 2016.
In polymer recycling, after almost two decades of decline, technology innovation has re-emerged to reach a worldwide peak of 423 priority patent filings in 2020 – an almost 130% increase on 2018 (186) and the most prolific patent filing year since 2000 (294).
Patent attorney Sarah Gibbs, Senior Associate at Appleyard Lees, said: “The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development’s 2022 report, Global Plastics Outlook: Policy Scenarios to 2060, predicts a three-fold increase in plastic pollution by that year unless there’s ‘action to curb demand, increase product lifespans and improve waste management and recyclability’.
“Patent filings in all types of biopolymers have risen in recent years, though increased activity in butylene-based polymers is notable over the past five years and could offer a valid route for manufacturers.”
Speaking at COP27, Miho Shirotori – officer in charge for the division on international trade and commodities at the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development – said: “The world should embrace reusable, biodegradable and compostable plastic substitutes. The future is not plastic…”
Conventional plastic properties and scale-up potential boosts butylene
Butylene-based polymers (such as polybutylene adipate terephthalate – PBAT) are biodegradable and anticipated to become more important to a bioplastics transition because of their parallel properties to conventional plastics. This includes – in the case of polybutylene succinate (PBS), clarity, processability and flexibility. This is coupled with their greater capacity for scaling up production.
Innovations and, consequently, patent applications involving butylene-based polymers include improvements to biodegradable packaging and single-use items. Israel’s Tipa Corporation is focusing on such applications by blending PBAT or PBS with other bioplastics (such as polylactic acid – PLA) to combine flexibility and strength. Meanwhile, Japan’s Mitsubishi Group is patenting innovation in tensile strength of PBS by combining it with an acrylic rubber.
While innovation in some biopolymers – such as Polyhydroxyalkaonates (PHAs) – has seen renewed interest, including Japan’s Kaneka Corporation developing a biopolymer fibre with improved tensile strength, patent filings in PLA and starch-based biopolymers have declined in recent years.
Next generation plastics recycling favours pyrolysis
Appleyard Lees’ patent data research reveals that pyrolysis – a process for decomposing polymer feedstock into smaller hydrocarbons – is currently taking the top spot among monomer regeneration recycling technologies. In 2020, this technology accounted for about 70% of patent filings among the four most common decomposition recycling approaches.
Company innovation activity is dominated by Eastman Chem Co., with more than 70 patent applications for polymer recycling in 2019-20 alone, followed by Sabic Global Technologies, whose applications include processing polymer waste by hydrotreatment and performing pyrolysis (thermal decomposition in the absence of oxygen).
Patent attorney David Walsh, Partner at Appleyard Lees, said: “Meanwhile, the pyrolysis process is dominating potential improvements in polymer recycling. Pyrolysis is clearly the main area of innovation in monomer recycling of polymers and the sudden rise in patent filings in 2019, plus a further increase in 2020, suggests a trend that will continue.
“These technologies potentially offer the opportunity to recycle polymers more effectively than current mechanical recycling processes and divert polymer waste from landfill or incineration.”
The Inside Green Innovation: Progress Report 2022’s focus on polymers was chosen because of its prominence in the global green innovation conversation, as referenced in the OECD’s and United Nations’ 17 Sustainable Development Goals and the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) Green Innovation Database, a global innovation catalogue that connects needs for solving environmental or climate change problems with sustainable solutions.*Appleyard Lees’ inaugural Inside Green Innovation: Progress Report 2022 is available to read here.