New plant-derived plastic to be used in multifunction office systems

15-Oct-08

Canon U.S.A, Inc., recently announced that Canon Inc. and Toray Industries, Inc., have successfully developed a bio-based plastic that achieves the world's highest level of flame retardance. The new bio-based plastic, 'Ecodear' includes more than 25% (by weight) of plant-derived component, will be used in exterior plastic parts for Canon multifunction office systems to be launched beginning next year. Ecodear is a plant-derived polylactic acid (PLA) that, with the addition of Toray-proprietary technology, realizes significant improvements in flame retardance, heat resistance, impact resistance and moldability. Particularly in the area of flame retardance, Ecodear is the world's first bio-based plastic applicable for use in multifunction office systems to achieve 5V classification under the UL 94 flammability testing program. The new bio-based plastic developed by Canon and Toray offers an expected 20% reduction in manufacturing-related CO2 emissions. Thus, this will enable its use not only for select parts in multifunction office systems, but also for replacing petroleum-based plastics used for exterior parts, which require a high level of flame retardance.