Moving Towards Materials For a Less Contaminated World in 2035

Over the past century, modern materials science has transformed life for the average person, enabling key technologies in electronics while bringing interesting items like nonstick cookware, waterproof clothing, and durable toy bricks into the homes of billions. While the chemicals and plastics revolution of the 20th century has undoubtedly impacted almost every facet of everyday life, there is increasing awareness of its positive and negative effects on human and environmental health. For example, petrochemical plastics face numerous end-of-life management issues, causing an ever-increasing global buildup of plastic waste. The OECD estimates that nearly 50% of plastic waste was landfilled in 2024, with another 20% mismanaged.

 

The microplastics generated from mismanaged plastic waste are not the only contaminants creeping into the environment. Per- and poly-fluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) are a ubiquitous class of chemicals that have infiltrated nearly every industry, human, and environment. One study from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) found PFAS in the blood of 97% of Americans. Other environmental studies have detected PFAS in remote regions far from human activities, like the North Pole. While studies on the impact of PFAS on human health are still ongoing, the US Environmental Protection Agency finds that PFAS exposure could be associated with increases in cholesterol levels, decreases in birth weight, kidney and testicular cancer, pregnancy-induced hypertension, and preeclampsia, among other health effects.

 

This growing awareness of the negative effects of these chemicals and materials we've built our modern society on has led governments, companies, academics, and consumers alike to search for alternatives. This will no doubt be a monumental task. In many places, there are no suitable replacements. In other areas, potential replacements exist but face numerous issues, from scaling to meet demand to becoming price competitive with incumbent materials. Still, significant activity is taking place worldwide, which IDTechEx has followed in our research, to push different sectors to identify chemicals and materials for a less contaminated, more circular world.

 

 

The PFAS family of chemicals, otherwise known as "forever chemicals" for their persistence in the environment, has not faced significant scrutiny until recently. Some PFAS had previously been regulated on a global level; for example, PFOA (perfluorooctanoic acid), PFOS (perfluorooctane sulfonate), and PFHxS (perfluorohexanesulfonic acid) have all been added to the Stockholm Convention, an international treaty to eliminate the use of persistent organic pollutants (POPs). A few others have been banned in the European Union, like perfluorinated carboxylic acids (C9-C14 linear and/or branched PFCAs). However, this is just a handful of the thousands of PFAS used daily in automotive, manufacturing, semiconductor, and medicine industries, amongst others. As such, it can be said that the entire PFAS family has gone largely unregulated for decades.

 

This changed in 2023 when the EU introduced the most wide-reaching PFAS regulation in the world. In practice, this universal PFAS ban seeks to limit PFAS to its most essential use cases; while some applications would have 13.5 years to commercialize and scale alternatives for PFAS, most industries would have just 1.5 years from when the regulation was implemented to phase out PFAS.

 

 

This unprecedented piece of regulation, which is still being debated and finalized by the European Commission, naturally sent shockwaves through the chemicals and materials industry in and around Europe. It has especially concerned those developing key technologies for the green transition, where some PFAS materials and chemicals are critical enablers for an emerging technology's growth.

 

The availability of alternatives for PFAS in high-tech industries like the hydrogen economy, thermal management for data centers, and electric vehicles is a key question explored in IDTechEx's "Per- and Polyfluoroalkyl Substances (PFAS) 2024: Emerging Applications, Alternatives, Regulations" report. For example, fuel cells utilize PFSA (perfluorosulfonic acid) ionomer membranes as a key component of the fuel cell assembly; if these were banned, what options would the fuel cell industry have? While some alternative membranes, like hydrocarbon membranes, are in development, the challenge of scaling these materials to serve the hydrogen economy will be significant. In this case, a universal PFAS ban poses an existential threat to the market of proton exchange membrane fuel cells (PEMFCs).

 

It's unclear whether such high-tech industries will be required to switch to non-PFAS alternatives so quickly, if at all. More recent communications from EU lawmakers indicate that time-limited and/or time-unlimited exemptions will be applied for technologies key to the EU's green transition strategy, including semiconductors and batteries. Still, this EU ban will force many other fields, like food packaging, to quickly shift to non-PFAS alternatives, potentially changing the landscapes of entire industries by 2035. As such, this will be a key area of regulations that IDTechEx will continue monitoring.

 

 

Another developing regulatory landscape is the regulations addressing the mismanagement of plastic waste; this problem has prompted many governments to introduce legislation to encourage and require recycling. The incumbent technology of mechanical recycling leads to downcycled plastic with limited reuse capabilities. However, an emerging range of technologies are being employed to solve this.

 

These include chemical transformation technologies such as pyrolysis, which involves the anaerobic heating of plastic waste to high temperatures to produce hydrocarbon feedstocks. Additionally, there is depolymerization, which involves breaking down polymers into monomer components so they can be repolymerized into new plastics. This can proceed via thermal, chemical, or enzymatic means; all three methods are discussed in-depth in IDTechEx's report, "Chemical Recycling and Dissolution of Plastics 2024-2034: Technologies, Players, Markets, Forecasts". Both pyrolysis and depolymerization approaches allow a virgin-like plastic material to be produced from waste. Finally, dissolution uses solvents to separate plastic waste from additives and contaminants and reform it into very high-quality plastic resin.

 

What these technologies have in common is their intent to overcome the inherent limitations of mechanical recycling, thus increasing the versatility of recycling. Ultimately, with these technologies, almost all plastic waste could be recycled. One key limitation is the price at which these recycled plastics can be sold. This is higher than virgin petrochemical and mechanically recycled plastics, driven primarily by the increased capital investments required for chemical recycling facilities and operating costs. For this reason, mechanical recycling is likely to remain the market-leading recycling technology. Still, the versatility and quality offered by advanced recycling technology means its uptake will be crucial in tackling currently unrecyclable waste.

 

No matter how much plastic is recycled, the amount produced each year is expected to at least double by the year 2050. Recycling alone cannot be the sole answer to increased plastic consumption; this means that a sustainable source of plastic, namely bioplastics, will be in demand. The term bioplastic describes any plastic that is derived from biobased sources. This can include biodegradable plastics, such as poly-lactic acids (PLAs) and polyhydroxyalkanoates (PHAs), but also non-biodegradable plastics, such as polypropylene (PP) and polyethylene terephthalate (PET) among many others. The full spectrum of bioplastics is examined in IDTechEx's report "Bioplastics 2025-2035: Technology, Market, Players, and Forecasts".

 

Legislation concerning bioplastics has lagged behind some of those aimed at plastics recycling. For example, many regulations ensuring minimum levels of recycled content in new plastic do not exempt bioplastics from the calculation.

 

 

However, the most transformational legislation affecting the bioplastics market has been the bans on single-use plastic packaging with an exemption on biodegradable alternatives. China stands out in this area, not just because of the size of the Chinese market but because China has encouraged the use of biodegradable plastics. This is unlike other developed countries that have approached the problem of single-use plastics by mandating alternative materials such as paper and wood. As a result, the Chinese market has seen an explosion in the production capacity for biodegradable bioplastics such as PLA, producing all sorts of items from single-use cutlery and cups to biodegradable plastic bags.

 

Choosing a biodegradable bioplastic also has the upside of improving waste management. Depending on the polymer composition and plastic format, the biodegradability of bioplastics varies significantly from home compostable to industrial compostable. A current drawback is the limited infrastructure to industrially compost materials like PLA. This will require government action and investment from plastics supply chain players to improve composting infrastructure. Another concern raised by companies adopting bioplastics is the effect of biodegradability on shelf life, which can affect supply chains. Ultimately, the market will need to adapt to these new materials in the long term.

 

The uptake of non-biodegradable bioplastics, often for performance applications, has been slower but is accelerating. This has been driven primarily by companies trying to reduce their carbon emissions. Using bioplastics is a way to significantly reduce these Scope 3 emissions, as end-to-end emissions of bioplastics are lower than conventional petrochemical plastics. One of the key limiting factors in this drive is the price of bioplastics, which are notably higher than their petrochemical counterparts. While this is expected to be mitigated by the scaling of bioplastics production, the price will likely continue to be a sticking point for many end-users.

 

The advantages of emerging technologies like chemical recycling and bioplastics mean that growth is still expected over the next ten years. However, it is still an open question of which individual materials and technologies will emerge as the market leaders in the future circular bioeconomy.

 

For more information on sustainable materials and technologies, please see the full portfolio of related research from IDTechEx at www.IDTechEx.com/Research/Sustainability. Downloadable sample pages are available for all IDTechEx reports.

This article is from "Technology Innovations Outlook 2025-2035", a free collection of insights from industry experts highlighting key technology innovation trends shaping the next decade. You can download the full collection here.

 

IDTechEx will be presenting a free-to-attend webinar on the topic on Friday 6 December 2024 - Sustainable Material Trends in 2025 for a Less Contaminated, More Circular World.

 

The technology areas covered in this webinar include:

 

We will be holding exactly the same webinar three times in one day. Please click here to register for the session most convenient for you.

 

If you are unable to make the date, please register anyway to receive the links to the on-demand recording (available for a limited time) and webinar slides as soon as they are available.

IDTechEx provides trusted independent research on emerging technologies and their markets. Since 1999, we have been helping our clients to understand new technologies, their supply chains, market requirements, opportunities and forecasts. For more information, contact research@IDTechEx.com or visit www.IDTechEx.com.