Friday 19 July 2019

Jaguar Land Rover explores using recycled plastic on its cars

Jaguar Land Rover is working with German chemical firm BASF to trial the use of premium-grade recycled plastics for its future vehicles.

The innovative process converts domestic waste plastic otherwise destined for landfill or incinerators into pyrolysis oil, which is then fed into BASF’s production chain as a replacement for virgin fossil fuel-based resources.

The firm says this creates products with the same high quality and performance as products made from primary materials.

The plastic can also be tempered and coloured, meaning it can be used to create dashboards and exterior panels for cars.

Jaguar Land Rover and BASF are currently testing the material to check it meets the same safety requirements of the existing original part, before working to bring it to commercial development.

Craig Woodburn, Global Environmental Compliance Manager at JLR, said: “As part of our commitment to accelerate closed loop manufacturing across our operations, we are always looking for advances in technology that will help to reduce waste.

"The ability to convert consumer waste into safe, quality parts for premium products through the ChemCycling process is an important step in advancing our ambition to deliver a zero-waste future."