Germany-based Evonik Industries recently inaugurated a new building to house precipitated silica applied technology for tyre and rubber at its Wesseling site near Cologne. In so doing, the speciality chemicals company has added applied technology to the world’s largest facility for precipitated silica production and research. Evonik invested an amount in the low tens of millions of Euro in the new building. The building was completed in only 13 months and 34 technicians and scientists have been working there since October 2013.
Dr. Johannes Ohmer, Head of the Inorganic Materials Business Unit of Evonik, said, “The unified and strengthened Wesseling team will now be able to work on qualitatively first-class production and on ideas for the future with its colleagues worldwide in an even more targeted and efficient manner. We and our customers will use these to grow our businesses throughout the globe together.”
A combination of precipitated silica and sulphur-functional silanes produced for the tyre and rubber industry enables tyre manufactures to reduce their products’ rolling resistance and improve their wet-grip. This can reduce fuel consumption by up to 8% in comparison to conventional tyres.
Evonik supplies precipitated silica to the tyre industry globally from Wesseling where silica production and research were previously located. Thus it made sense to re-locate application engineering to the Wesseling site.
Innovative products for the rubber industry are being developed and tested in the new 2,500 sq m building. Strict quality control, which is standardised worldwide, is applied to several thousand mixtures annually. The building itself is setting new standards for resource efficiency. It is heated using waste heat from the plant’s silica production.
To be closer to its worldwide customers and provide them with first-class products, Evonik has undertaken a robust worldwide capacity expansion. In March 2014, it opened an expanded precipitated silica facility in Thailand; in May 2013, it initiated planning for a new facility in Brazil; and it will begin operations later this year in an expanded facility in Chester, Pennsylvania, US. Evonik’s global silica production capacity will increase by approximately 30% over its 2010 capacity by the end of 2014.