What is bio-based PE and what are the advantages of the material?

This is polyethylene with a high proportion of renewable raw materials (at least 80 %). Sugar cane is currently the starting material. Biobased PE is a good alternative to conventional, fossil polyethylene.

A major advantage of biobased PE is the fact that the material has a negative CO₂ balance (cradle-to-factory gate). In addition, the raw material achieves by far the highest yield per area: at 76.7 t / ha, the yield per area for sugar cane is around 8.5 times higher than for maize (source: Stoffliche Nutzung nachwachsender Rohstoffe, Oliver Türk, Springer Fachmedien, Wiesbaden 2014).

Biobased PE has the same material structure as conventional PE and therefore also has better material properties compared to recycled plastics, e.g. with regard to tear resistance. The material is also completely recyclable in the existing recycling streams.

In principle, recycling is the best of all recycling options for this material. If this – for whatever reasons – is not possible, thermal recycling (waste incineration plant) would also make sense, as long as fossil fuels are used to generate energy. This is due to the fact that the starting material (sugar cane plant) already binds CO₂ during the growth process. In the event of combustion, no additional CO₂ is released into the atmosphere. In addition, energy can be obtained from combustion.