The high summer months are often labelled as a lull in the business calendar. However, the industrial gases sector is rarely dormant and this month has been no exception with several sector revelations stealing international news inches.
Consequently, this hot topic offers readers an exclusive window into the most important of these latest scientific murmurs precious moments before it transforms into a quake of, well, global magnitude.
Seemingly simple, it is the very recent discovery by the North American based group, Novomer, that carbon dioxide can be converted into food packaging. Briefly summarised, the company has honed a proprietary catalyst that enables waste CO2 to be inserted into an epoxide which forms a polymer especially suited to food packaging and coating.
The new coatings are made of approximately 40% CO2, while the chemical process is cost and resource efficient.The breakthrough has attracted large sums of federal and corporate investment and hopes to provide a non-hazardous replacement to bisphenol A (BPA) in the linings of food and drink. By creating an alternative polymer, Novomer will address a very recent turn among corporations such as Heinz to phase-out BPA within their product packaging.
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