From Denmark comes the news that LEGO will replace its fossil-based plastics by 2030 with sustainable alternatives. The company announced that it will invest $150 million in the effort to cover research, development and implementation of new raw materials to manufacture LEGO elements as well as packaging materials. Immediately, the company has established a LEGO Sustainable Materials Centre and expects to recruit more than 100 employees in the effort.<\/p>\n
Currently, the company uses 6,000 tons per year of ABS (acrylonitrile butadiene styrene) to manufacture more than 60 billion LEGO elements.<\/p>\n
The centre will be based at the LEGO Group\u2019s headquarters in Billund, Denmark,and will be established during 2015 and 2016. It is expected that it will include satellite functions located in relevant locations around the globe. In addition, the centre will collaborate and develop partnerships with relevant external stakeholders and experts.<\/p>\n
An example is the Climate Savers partnership between the LEGO Group and WWF signed in 2013, which has targets on developing a sustainable materials strategy. A new collaboration with WWF was agreed in spring 2015 and focuses on better assessing the overall sustainability and environmental impact of new bio-based materials for LEGO elements and packaging.<\/p>\n
ABS is a blend \u2014 roughly, half styrene and the other half butadiene and acrylonitrile. Today, styrene is made from fossil fuels, via benzene and ethylene; butadiene is made primarily from butane; and acrylonitrile is made from ammonia and propylene.<\/p>\n
So, think sustainable, renewable ammonia, benzene, propylene, ethylene, and butadiene \u2014 or, perhaps an alternative, high-performance novel molecule with similar cost and strength performance will be found.<\/p>\n
A number of players have jumped into the early stages of the race for renewable butadiene. Genomatica\/Versalis are hot on the trail of butadiene, with LanzaTech\/INVISTA, Arzeda\/INVISTA and Global Bioenergies\/Synthos. Axens, IFP Energies nouvelles and Michelin announced a partnership in 2013 to develop a bio-butadiene process. Back in 2011, Amyris announced a collaboration agreement with Kurara<\/a>y to replace petroleum-derived feedstock such as butadiene and isoprene in the production of specified classes of high-performing polymers, but we haven\u2019t heard much on that lately.<\/p>\n One interesting contender over in the area of benzene is Anellotech, whose single step CFP process, invented by Professor George Huber (then University of Massachusetts-Amherst, now at the University of Wisconsin-Madison) and colleagues, enables non-edible renewable biomass to be processed in a fluidized-bed reactor into aromatics, including benzene, toluene and xylenes (BTX) \u2014 critical for packaging, nylons, polystyrenes, rubber \u2014 even octane boosters in everyday fuels.<\/p>\n So, there\u2019s lots of current activity on styrene and butadiene \u2014 not as much on acrylonitrile. In recent months, Cargill acquired OPX Biotechnologies, which was focused on 3-HP (3-hydroxypropionic acid) via fermentation, which is then converted in one step to bio-based acrylic acid. But that technology has pathways to a collection of target molecules, which include acrylonitrile, as well as\u00a0 butanol, BDO, 3-HP,\u00a0acetyl-CoA, malonyl-CoA, malonate semialdehyde, 3-HP, acrylic acid, PDO, malonic acid, ethyl 3-HP, propiolactone,acrylamide, methyl acrylate, a polymer including super absorbent polymers and polyacrylic acid.<\/p>\n OPX Bio had developed what is generally believed to be a world-class capability in strain and metabolic engineering towards that end.<\/p>\nThings you can make from BTX<\/h4>\n