Volvo Sets Target of 25 Percent Sustainable Plastic in Cars by 2025

Volvo Cars has set itself the target of using 25 percent sustainable plastic in its cars by 2025. The company is working with Rondo Plast, a member of the Polykemi Group in order to attain this goal. Volvo Cars recently unveiled a demonstrator vehicle that highlights its commitment to achieving this objective.
The demonstrator car is derived from the current XC60 model. In this vehicle, plastic components of which the total weight came to about 60 kg were replaced by parts made from recycled plastic. Fredrik Holst, product manager at Rondo Plast said that as a compounder, the company was involved in the project right from the very beginning of the development of the car. It supplies Repro compounds based on polypropylene (PP), polycarbonate/acrylonitrile-butadiene-styrene (PC/ABS) and other resins.

Rondo sources its recycled plastic materials from both industrial and consumer waste. The materials that Rondo supplied for the demonstrator car were used in its air ducts, the central console behind the radio and the display, the wheel arcs, and the loading floor support structure, among other applications.
Fredrik Holst said that Rondo’s material is generally used in load-bearing and technical components which are normally covered by a surface material and it is by using recycled plastic for these components that Volvo Cars hopes to achieve its ambitious goal of having recycled plastic replace at least 25 percent of the plastic in its cars by 2025.

“We take our hat off to Volvo Cars for being the first vehicle manufacturer in the premium segment to take this stand. It is our absolute intention to continue to be the partner in quality assured compounds based on wholly or partly recycled raw materials,” concluded Fredrik Holst.