BMW Group uses renewable raw materials to produce automotive coatings

        The BMW Group is the first automaker to place its trust in more sustainable automotive OEM coatings certified by BASF’s biomass balance approach. The BMW Group has chosen BASF to produce automotive coatings CathoGuard® 800 ReSource electrocoat from renewable raw materials at its sites in Leipzig, Germany, and Rosslyn, South Africa, and iGloss® matt ReSource clearcoat throughout Europe.

        Using these more sustainable product lines in automotive coatings avoids around 40% of CO2 emissions per coat of paint; the sites will thereby save more than 15,000 tons of CO2 emissions by 2030. “As the largest supplier of chemical products to the automotive industry, BASF is aware of our responsibility to support our customers with innovative, ecologically efficient solutions. The mass balance approach allows us to make our coating solutions more sustainable while maintaining the same quality. We are pleased that the BMW Group has chosen to take the lead in the automotive industry and that our products play a key role in helping it achieve its ambitious sustainability goals,” said Dr. Markus Kamieth, member of the Board of Executive Directors of BASF SE.

        “By reducing the use of fossil raw materials, we can conserve natural resources and at the same time reduce CO2 emissions. To achieve this, we increasingly need sustainable innovations from our supplier network, and innovative coatings based on renewable raw materials are an important step in this direction.”

      “By reducing the use of fossil raw materials, we can conserve natural resources and at the same time reduce CO2 emissions,” said Joachim Post, BMW Group Member responsible for Procurement and Supplier Network. “To achieve this, we increasingly need sustainable innovations from our supplier network, and innovative coatings based on renewable raw materials are an important step in this direction.”

        The BMW Group's plants in Leipzig and Rosslyn produce an average of around 250,000 vehicles per year.

        CathoGuard 800 electrocoat technology effectively protects car body edges from corrosion and helps millions of vehicles extend their service life. Its mass balance approach, CathoGuard 800 ReSource, reduces the carbon footprint of the product from the utilization of materials used in electrocoat applications without changing the product formulation.

        Through BASF's mass balance approach, renewable raw materials such as bio-based naphtha and biomethane from organic waste are used as raw materials to produce basic chemicals for production at the Verbund site. The bio-based raw material content of a specific product is then calculated and allocated to the sales product in a certified manner. This attribution model is similar to the principle of green electricity. An independent certification confirms that BASF has replaced the amount of fossil resources required for a mass-balanced product with renewable raw materials.