German plant manufacturer Uhde Inventa-Fischer (Berlin; www.uhde-inventa-fischer.com) has extended its range of polycondensation technologies to include polybutylene succinate (PBS) production. The PBS biopolymer is produced from succinic acid and butanediol in a continuous polycondensation process.

The company said the technology uses two reactors, “Espree” and “Discage”, and enables high-quality resin to be produced in an energy-efficient and resource-conserving process. Uhde Inventa-Fischer offers its customers plants with a capacity of at least 40,000 t/y of PBS polymer, produced either completely or partially from renewable resources. The polymer is biodegradable and has properties comparable to those of PP and PE.

The company, part of ThyssenKrupp (Essen / Germany; www.thyssenkrupp.com), said the material has a melting point of 120°C, good barrier properties and high material stability, making it suitable for the production of packaging materials, films, textiles and engineering plastics. Tailored properties can also be achieved by compounding the material to be produced.

In addition to this PBS technology, ThyssenKrupp Uhde has developed a succinic acid technology in cooperation with US biochemical producer Myriant (Quincy, Massachusetts; www.myriant.com) and is currently building a pilot plant for the production of succinic acid from glucose in Leuna / Germany. The plant is due to come on stream in the third quarter of this year.

Meanwhile, Myriant has been awarded a USD 50m cost-sharing grant from the US Department of Energy (Washington DC; www.energy.gov) for a bio-succinic acid plant in Lake Providence, Louisiana. Scheduled for start-up in the first quarter of 2013, the plant will produce 13,500 t/y of bio-succinic acid – the largest facility of its kind in the US. This initial capacity has already been sold and plans are in place to further expand the company’s production capacity in 2014 both domestically and internationally.