Insulation industry news from Global Insulation

World: Market research firm Future Market Insights (FMI) has forecast a composite annual growth rate of 6% in the global polyisocyanurate (PIR) insulation market up to 2033. This will result in 81% decade-on-decade growth to US$25.6bn in 2033. FMI noted technical developments affecting the use of customised PIR boards in the prefabricated construction as a main driver of the growth. Nationally, the market will have a CAGR of 8% in China, 7% in India, 6% in the UK, 5% in Canada and 4% in Germany.

FMI said “In the rapidly changing world of PIR insulation, innovation and sustainability have emerged as dynamic forces reshaping the industry’s trajectory. The market is going through a fundamental shift, moving beyond its traditional role of providing insulation and into uncharted territory where cutting-edge technologies are poised to redefine its boundaries.”

Belarus: A delegation from the Belarusian Universal Commodity Exchange (BUCE) has entered into negotiations with Chinese synthetic fibres producers for the import of their materials. UZDA News has reported that the products will serve as raw materials for the Belarusian light building materials industry.

BUCE said "Chinese companies have become increasingly active, making regular transactions. This year, China supplied Belarus with spare parts, industrial tools, and technological equipment – mainly import-substituting products.”

Chinese imports were valued at US$84m in the opening seven months of 2024, more than double the figure for the corresponding period in 2023.

Kazakhstan: Russia-based TechnoNICOL has begun building its upcoming US$124m Karaganda insulation plant. Interfax Kazakhstan Newswire has reported that the plant will export 30% of its insulation to Russia. Additionally, it will export some insulation to China, Kyrgyzstan, Mongolia and Uzbekistan.

Denmark: Rockwool’s net sales grew by 27% year-on-year to Euro3.91bn in 2022 from Euro3.09bn in 2021. Its earnings before interest, taxation, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) rose by 6% to Euro638m from Euro602m. The group reported a strong start to 2022 with high demand for its stone wool insulation products. In the second half of the year it noted a decline in construction activity in key markets. However, it increased its prices leading to increased sales. By region the group said that sales grew in Europe and Asian markets, were flat in the US and declined in China.

Chief executive officer Jens Birgersson said, “Looking forward, we expect construction activity to continue slowing down in the coming period. We anticipate the energy efficiency agenda in both Europe and North America will accelerate renovation rates in the mid-term and create higher demand for our circular and non-combustible stone wool. We will continue to invest in more capacity to support our long-term growth”.

Together with the group’s chair Thomas Kähler, he also defended the company’s decision to continue the ownership of a subsidiary in Russia. “If we were to depart Russia, our factories and the intellectual property rights to our unique technology would most likely be nationalised or otherwise transferred to local players. Since the factories operate independently of our head office, they would continue to operate - just under different ownership. It therefore remains our view that retaining the business in Russia is the least bad option available to us. And of course, we will continue to comply with all international sanctions.”

Rockwool said that it had added production capacity for its Grodan agricultural stone wool range at its plant in Toronto, Canada and capacity for its Rockfon stone wool ceiling panel range at its Cigacice plant in Poland. In China it had opened a new plant at Qinyuan in December 2022 to replace its mineral wool unit at Guangzhou, which closed in September 2022. It also reported that plans to build a new stone wool plant at Soissons in France had been delayed due to a local legal challenge. Notable upgrades in 2022 included the start of a conversion project to electric melting technology from fossil fuels at the Flumroc plant in Switzerland, with a commissioning date scheduled for 2024. This project follows a similar one at the Moss plant in Norway that was completed in 2020.

China/US: France-based Arkema has announced progress at two locations towards increasing the production capacity of its blowing agent product Forane 1233ZD. In China the group says its partner Aofan has started operation at a production plant. In the US at Calvert City, Kentucky the group has broken ground on the construction of an upgrade to a production line at its existing plant. The US$60m project is expected to be completed by early 2024. Both units are intended to increase the global availability of the Forane 1233ZD product.

The chemicals company is promoting the use of fluorinated liquid blowing agent due to its sustainability advantages. The product is used primarily in closed celled polyurethane foam for building insulation and cold chain applications. It also has applications for the thermal management of batteries in electric vehicles.

Denmark: Rockwool says that high construction and renovation activity in the residential sector mainly drove its insulation sales in 2021. Insulation business sales grew by 20% year-on-year to Euro2.29bn in 2021 from Euro1.91bn. Its earnings before interest and taxation (EBIT) rose by 17% to Euro275m from Euro236m. Strong growth was reported in Europe, solid sales in North America but some parts of China and elsewhere in Asia were negatively affected by coronavirus-related closures of some markets. The producer commented that its insulation sales increased ‘significantly’ in 2021 even compared to 2019 before the coronavirus pandemic started. However, it warned that “sales prices and productivity gains did not fully offset the accelerating inflation on production materials, energy and logistic costs.”

“The surprising speed of the 2021 economic rebound also brought challenges, including inventory and material shortages in some markets as well as logistics challenges that required creative solutions. Special thanks go to our customers for their patience and especially our people working in the factories and across the commercial, technical, procurement, and support teams, who worked together to reduce customer delays,” said chair Thomas Kähler and chief executive officer Jens Birgersson in a statement. Overall, group net sales grew by 19% to Euro3.09bn from Euro2.60bn. EBITDA increased by 15% to Euro602m from Euro522m.

Luxembourg: Armacell recorded consolidated net sales of Euro591m in 2020, down by 8% year-on-year from Euro644m in 2019. Its earnings before interest, taxation, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) fell by 10% to Euro120m from Euro134m. During the year, the company completed a polyethylene terephthalate (PET) foaming line expansion in Suzhou, China, built an elastometric foams plant in Cheonan, South Korea and consolidated its Italian insulation activities at a new facility in Turin. It also made strategic investments in diversified areas.

President and chief executive officer Patrick Mathieu said, “In a complex and challenging environment our business model again proved resilient. With our global reach and multi-segment activity, we ended the year in relatively good shape. We took the appropriate measures to navigate changing circumstances and ensure we come out of the pandemic stronger than before. Our utmost priority was always to safeguard the health of our employees, maintain operations and continuously support our customers.” He added, “After the successful closure of our capital market refinancing in February 2020, our shareholders PAI Partners and KIRKBI expressed their commitment to our on-going growth strategy. In 2021, we look forward to partnering with our customers in adding value to their businesses.”

Denmark: Rockwool recorded net sales of Euro2.60bn, down by 4% year-on-year in local currency terms. Profit for the year fell by 12% to Euro251m. Sales were supported in regions where construction was able to remain active throughout the coronavirus lockdowns. The company noted a strong recovery in the fourth quarter of 2020.

Chief executive officer Jens Birgersson said, “Looking back on a turbulent year, we are proud of how well our colleagues handled the many challenges. Our teams ensured employees were safe while quickly adjusting operations, sales and service to match the changing needs of our customers.”

The company plans to make Euro370m of investments, excluding acquisitions in 2021. Planned investments include a new plant in the US and a plant relocation in China, in addition to capacity expansions for its Rockfon and Grodan stone wool businesses.

The group said, “The underlying medium to long-term structural growth drivers for stone wool products are even stronger today than at the start of 2020. On top of fundamental trends like urbanisation and increasingly tighter building regulations, we expect that several other trends will continue driving growth in our business. For example, the growing focus on energy efficiency, fire safety and circularity continues to influence the decisions of consumers, the building industry and policymakers, with the pandemic accelerating these trends in multiple ways.”

US: Stepan has recorded a first-half income before tax of US$63.4m, up by 15% year-on-year from US$55.2m in the first half of 2020. Net sales were US$910m, down by 5.4% year-on-year from US$962m. Polymer sales, which includes sales of Stepan’s rigid foam insulation polyols, fell by 20% to US$112m from US$141m due to lower North American and European demand, “reflecting Covid-19 construction project delays,” according to the company. This was partly offset by increased sales volumes of 41% from its China division.

China/Japan: Researchers from Kyoto University, the University of Tokyo in Japan and Jiangsu Normal University in China have developed a new material that can selectively capture carbon dioxide (CO₂) molecules and convert them into ‘useful’ organic materials, including a precursor for polyurethane. The research project has been described in the journal Nature Communications.

The material is a porous coordination polymer (PCP, also known as a metal-organic framework), a framework consisting of zinc metal ions. The researchers tested their material using X-ray structural analysis and found that it can selectively capture only CO₂ molecules with ten times more efficiency than other PCPs. The material has an organic component with a propeller-like molecular structure, and as CO₂ molecules approach the structure, they rotate and rearrange to permit CO₂ trapping, resulting in slight changes to the molecular channels within the PCP. This allows it to act as molecular sieve that can recognise molecules by size and shape. The PCP is also recyclable; the efficiency of the catalyst did not decrease even after 10 reaction cycles.

After capturing the carbon, the converted material can be used to make polyurethane, a material with a wide variety of applications including insulation materials.