Zeon, Yokohama Rubber in tie-up to advance sustainable rubber production

Tokyo – Zeon Corp. and Yokohama Rubber Co. (YRC) have joined forces to establish a 'bench facility' to demonstrate technology for the “highly efficient” production of butadiene from sustainable ethanol.

The ‘bench facility’ will include a large-scale unit where the partners can acquire the data necessary to transition to a continuous pilot facility, towards commercialisation of the process.

The unit will be installed at Zeon’s Tokuyama plant in Shunan city, Yamaguchi Prefecture, Japan, and is scheduled to begin operating in 2026.

It will enable the production of “a certain amount of butadiene” from ethanol and facilitate the collection of data to be used for mass production.

The technology will employ a “highly efficient” catalyst to convert sustainable ethanol to butadiene.

The process will then be used to mass produce synthetic rubber from plant-based and other sustainable feedstock.

Zeon will develop a prototype polybutadiene rubber from the butadiene produced at the bench facility, and YRC will develop prototype tires using the butadiene rubber.

The tire maker will also conduct driving tests using the tires to collect data needed for a more large-scale demonstration of the technology.

The partners aim to complete the technology by 2030 and commercialise the production of rubber by 2034.

The initiative is aligned with R&D themes selected by Japan’s new energy and industrial technology development organisation (NEDO) and is supported by the Japanese National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology.

Furthermore, Zeon and YRC are also working on a second NEDO project supported by Institute of Science Tokyo and RIKEN.

The project will involve the development of a “biotechnology” to directly produce butadiene and isoprene from plant-based materials.

That project, too, is scheduled for commercialisation by 2034.