DSM, Novomer to develop first CO2-based resin coatings

Royal DSM NV, the global life sciences and materials sciences company headquartered in the Netherlands, and Novomer Inc, based in Waltham (Massachusetts, United States), today said that they plan to jointly develop a revolutionary coating resin using carbon dioxide (CO2) as a raw material.

This development agreement follows a cooperation pact and an investment by DSM Venturing in Novomer in 2007.

The joint development will benefit from the broad variety of DSM's technologies and market access, in combination with the unique, efficient CO2 polymerisation technology from Novomer, a new materials company pioneering a family of low-cost, high-performance, sustainable plastics, polymers and other chemicals.

Based on the pioneering catalyst work of Dr Geoff Coates at Cornell University, Novomer's groundbreaking technology allows carbon dioxide and other renewable feedstocks to be cost-effectively transformed into polymers, plastics and other chemicals for a wide variety of industrial markets.

Novomer's products combine environmental benefits with improved performance and can be used in a range of applications, from injection molded parts, specialty binders for electronics, polymeric packaging materials to paper coatings and medical implants.

Acording to the agreement with DSM, the chemistry and process technology for producing polymers from CO2 and propylene oxide (PO) will be developed by Novomer, while DSM will convert the polymers into resins and formulate them for target applications such as coatings, adhesives and graphic arts.