Page 13 from: November 2015
11November 2015
N E W S
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The butler’s night off
A wealthy couple have planned to go out for the evening and decide to give
their butler, Carson, the rest of the night off. The lady of the house says they
will be home very late and so he should just enjoy his evening. As it turns out,
however, she isn’t having a good time at the party and returns home early on
her own.
As she walks into the dining room, she sees Carson sitting by himself next to
the fire. She takes the glass of wine from his hand, tells him to follow her and
leads him into the master bedroom. She then closes the door and locks it. She
looks at the butler and says: ‘Carson, take off my dress.’ He does this carefully.
‘Now take off my stockings and garter,’ she orders him. He silently obeys her,
trying to keep his cool. ‘Now remove my bra and panties.’ He does this amid
mounting tension. She looks him in the eyes and says: ‘Carson, if I ever catch
you wearing my clothes again, you’re fired.’
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People
Jürgen Schachler
Jürgen Schachler has been named as the new executive board chairman of leading
copper producer and recycler Aurubis. Set to take up the role on April 1 next year,
Schachler has been appointed initially until March 31 2019 and succeeds Dr Bernd
Drouven, who will switch back to the supervisory board on November 1 this year.
www.aurubis.com
Steve Pohl
Rolled products leader Novelis Inc. has confirmed Steve Pohl as its new interim
chief financial officer. The vice president of financial planning & analysis has
assumed the role with immediate effect, replacing Steve Fisher who was promoted
to chief executive officer in August. Pohl will lead all financial activities for Novelis
until such time as a permanent chief financial officer is appointed.
www.novelis.com
Mixed picture for US
plastics scrap exports
US plastics scrap exports were a
shade lower across the first eight months
of this year as a result of steep drops in
some of the leading polymer segments.
US overseas shipments of PET scrap
tumbled almost 17% from 250 323 tonnes
in January-August 2014 to 208 044 tonnes
in this year’s corresponding period while
styrenes slumped 15.9% to 16 323 tonnes.
Vinyl chloride scrap suffered an even
sharper drop of 21.4% to 136 362 tonnes
whereas ethylene scrap exports edged just
1.3% lower to 485 192 tonnes, according
to latest figures from the US Census Bureau
and US International Trade Commission.
On the upside, the ‘other plastics’
category witnessed an increase in exports
of 16.1% to 584 235 tonnes, with the
result that US overseas shipments of all
forms of plastics scrap slipped just 0.6%
overall to 1.43 million tonnes from
almost 1.44 million tonnes in the opening
eight months of 2014.
Compared to that same period last year,
the value of US plastics scrap exports fell
8% in January-August 2015 to US$ 574
million. There was a slump in US export
sales to mainland China (-21%),
Indonesia (-41%) and South Korea
(-33%) while the drop for shipments to
India was 9%. Conversely, business
increases were recorded with Hong Kong
(+17%), Vietnam (+22%) and Canada
(+4%). www.census.gov
Solvay targets technical
textiles with Polish plant
According to international chemi-
cals group Solvay, construction of its
industrial-scale facility for the recycling
of technical textile waste from post-
industrial sources is right on schedule.
The plant at Gorzów in Poland is set to
be fully operational in 2016.
The initiative is part of Solvay’s
Move4earth project, which is backed by
the European Commission’s LIFE+
programme. The venture will focus on
designing, implementing and validating
an innovative recycling process designed
to ‘revalue technical textile waste’ –
initially from airbags – into high-quality
polyamide 6.6 (PA6.6) grades. Solvay will
use proprietary recycling technology for
separating the airbag fabrics from the
coating, delivering a PA6.6 premium
recyclate ‘with no significant loss in
material properties’, including stable
viscosity and robust mechanical perfor-
mance. In addition, Solvay will explore
applications for the silicone coating by-
product separated from the airbag fab-
rics, which makes up roughly 15% of the
material flow. ‘More than 70% of all
automotive airbags in Europe are made
of silicone-coated nylon fabrics,’ says
Richard Bourdon, Move4earth project
director at Solvay. But there is currently
‘no sustainable solution’ in place for
post-consumer airbag waste in Europe.
www.solvay.com


