rCB News November 2024
Martin von Wolfersdorff
Circular Strategy for Leaders ⌞𝗖𝗮𝗿𝗯𝗼𝗻 𝗠𝗮𝘁𝗲𝗿𝗶𝗮𝗹𝘀 𝗚𝘂𝗿𝘂⌝ Empowering Tire, Carbon Black & Petrochemical Leaders | Follow me for Insights!
Dear colleagues & friends of recovered Carbon Black,
Here is your November dose of recovered Carbon Black news! We now have 6,854 subscribers and counting! Do we reach 7k in 2024?
Overview
The rCB Europe Conference 2024 in Amsterdam
Where to begin? Well let's begin at the start. If you want to watch or re-watch my opening of rCB Europe 2024, you can do that on my Youtube channel which focusses on rCB, carbon black and chemical recycling.
Pre-conference workshop
We had a full house at the pre-conference workshop and a vivid discussion inspired by the workshop presentations by Paul Ita , Dave Abdallah , Shane Perl and myself. I like this smaller, more "cosy" format because for participants it is easier to ask questions and discuss in a smaller group of 40-70 than in the big forum of rCB Europe of 300-388.
Community of 500 colleagues
While I am waiting for my Smithers colleagues to confirm our final delegates number, on the Swapcard rCB Europe app and website, I can see 316 attendees. This number plus the 180 attendees of rCB Asia make our rCB community about 500 colleagues strong!
Positive energy throughout
We always say that the current rCB conference is the best ever, but the energy in the rCB Europe 2024 conference was something special. Business in the Expo was buzzing like in a beehive, so much that during my session as a chair, I needed to get people back in the conference with clinking glasses and ringing a bell.
Some personal picks & quotes
Allen Timpany presented Circtec 's gripping journey to securing funding. Although the group's name "Circtec" is quite new, it became quite clear that this success has been in the making for decades.
Maria Vera Duran from EuRIC - The European Recycling Industries made an important point and call-to-action for improving the management of risks and against the precautionary principle of ECHA.
Robert Harper from Circtec said in the CEO panel
"Extended Producer Responsibility systems favour lowest cost tyre recycling, i.e. exports."
I always thought that EPR systems simplify recycling and the circular industry. But with my research and mapping the whole European tyre recycling industry for a client, I was surprised to find that many countries with EPR systems have several consortia, France has 3 and Italy even 7. And it is clear that the EPR value chain is front fed, most of the money sticks with the points of sale, not with the ELT processor. How could this be improved?
The CEO panel sparked some other great quotes like Tony Wibbeler from Bolder Industries saying
"The pyrolysis process makes only 25% of the rCB quality."
I loved the applications session chaired by Alex Bowles from Orion S.A. with presenters including Loïc PICARD from Hutchinson , David Hardy from ARLANXEO and carl cumming and Fredrik Nilsson from Trelleborg Group . Application development is so important for rCB, but from the view of compounders it is also challenging to formulate around a moving target specification.
It was interesting to see two alternative processes to pyrolysis in the presentations: The Solvolysis process presented by Jean-Philippe Toupance from Axens and the acqueous oxidising process presented by Ian Byberg from Arduro . But do these processes produce rCB as per ASTM terminology? ("rCB: solid product recovered via thermal decomposition from rubber goods which contain carbon black, which is free of wire and fabric, and when milled typically gives semi-reinforcing properties in rubber.") What do you think?
Stefano Madeddu from Infiniteria - Cuibhil Luxco 2 had the last presentation, which I always call the closing key note because you can take reference to previous presentations. And Stefano did. He compared the Infiniteria business model with that of Circtec:
"With smaller and more decentralised plants, we take the opposite approach of Circtec."
I am already in contact with a good crowd who would love to present next year at rCB Europe 2025 in Barcelona. After the conference is before the conference. See you there next year and message me if I can be of help for your business journey with rCB!
PS: If you wonder when the PDF presentations will be shared, please be patient and fill out the conference feedback survey where you will find the download link after completion of the survey!
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The MOVIN'ON Summit 2024 in Brussels
The MOVIN'ON Summit 2024 put its 300 participants in the year 2035, imagining what transformations will have been accomplished in the key topics of decarbonising transport:
There were also smaller interactive panels about:
In a difficult time for the European tyre industry, this Michelin lead initiative provided ample inspiration and a lot of positive energy for tackling all these important tasks.
I found the discussed topics highly transferable to the industries I work with, the tyre, rubber, plastics and carbon black industries. And I will detail a whole bunch of these inspirations in my upcoming YouTube video about the MOVIN'ON Summit.
Some of the key messages sticking in my mind were:
Florent Menegaux (CEO Michelin) on ecology, circularity and ecosystems:
"There will be no ecology without economy, no circularity without a business model."
"We should create a legislation in favour of an ecosystem to emerge, not about the ecosystem itself."
After 10 years working on tyre-to-tyre recycling, I agree 100% on both quotes. Sustainability must be profitable and governance for sustainability should support but not dictate the type of ecosystems.
Philippe Kehren (CEO Solvay) on Sustainable European Competitivity:
"Today, we are facing two main challenges: (1) In Europe we only have the stick, we don't have the carrot. (2) The second one is, we are overwhelmed by regulations."
This quote really captures challenges with EU governance for sustainability and circularity. We have too many prescriptions and not enough enablement. Hopefully this will change!
Florent Menegaux (CEO Michelin) on A.I.:
"Every tool and process we create is to help the inner mobility and the development of people."
Florent Menegaux said this words in the closing session and they resonated with me. We live in a time were A.I. is all over us, but yet it is limited and risky. I like the focus on humans and putting A.I. at its place to serve humans.
Thank you for reading!
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