Market-ready bio-based ACE coatings

The European Green Deal aims to achieve CO2 neutrality by 2050. For this goal, we cannot only do big changes, but also the small details in economy and everyday life are decisive. With this thought, our R&D specialists at KANSAI HELIOS didn’t want to invent totally new products, but took a look at our existing products in the ACE segment.

The R&D specialists decided to start the green transition with some of our best-selling, solvent-based high-solids products: a fast-curing, wet-on-wet epoxy primer (EP-P), a thick-layer polyurethane topcoat (PU-TC) and a polyurethane monolayer with increased weather resistance (PU-DTM).

The old EP-P primer version contained about 9% bio based components and with this basis, our R&D specialists have managed to increase the percentage to 43%. Therefore, we could archive the EP-P primer and have now the EP-P/bio version on the market.

The starting point for the development of PU-TC/bio was the commercially available PU-TC with just over 1% organic content. Bio-based ingredients were used in all organic film-forming components, binders, hardeners and additives and the formulation was adjusted so that it optimally matches the petroleum-based products. The resulting PU-TC/bio contains 32.5 % bio-based ingredients.

The introduction of a significant proportion of bio-based ingredients in PU-DTM followed the same development pattern as the PU topcoat. Bio-based functional equivalents of the petroleum-based raw materials made it possible to increase the bio-based content of PU-DTM/bio to 35.9% – from 3 % in conventional PU-DTM.

With this seemingly small steps, we increased the bio-based components of our existing products significantly. The properties of the new organic products differ only slightly from the old ones. Once more, the R&D specialists at KANSAI HELIOS showed their innovative spirit and have thus made a major contribution to achieving the climate targets.