Obtained ‘ISCC Plus’ international certification for eco-friendly materials

BIO FRIENDS, a DME (dimethyl ether) production and supply company, is speeding up the bioenergy business by acquiring an eco-friendly international certification 'ISCC PLUS'.

BIO FRIENDS (CEO Cho Won-jun) announced that it has obtained the certification of "ISCC (International Sustainability & Carbon Certification) Plus," an international certification system for eco-friendly materials on 15th, January.

In the field of carbon-neutral low-carbon raw material DME, BIO FRIENDS was the first to be certified in Korea, he added.

ISCC Plus is an international certification system that conforms to the European Union (EU) Renewable Energy Use Guidelines (RED) and is given to sustainable and low-carbon products sold in the global market. It mainly targets bio-material-based products, and products that use eco-friendly raw materials throughout the process from production to distribution are selected.

"This certification is significant because it was acquired for the first time in the aerosol industry," said Cho Won-jun, CEO of BIO FRIENDS. "In particular, this BioDME is a cooperative project achieved through international cooperation in that it was manufactured, produced, and sold from BioMethanol, a raw material imported from OCI Global.“

As part of the Net-Zero project in Chungcheongbukdo, which aims to be carbon neutral from 2021, BIO FRIENDS is developing a technology to produce clean methanol and DME by collecting carbon dioxide (CO ₂) emitted from the Sungshin Yanghoe cement industry in Danyang-gun, Chungcheongbukdo, to produce clean fuel. It aims to produce carbon-neutral raw materials from green hydrogen or turquoise hydrogen after 2030.

CEO Cho Won-jun said, "With the acquisition of ISCC Plus certification, we are discussing ways to produce bioDME at BioMethanol production sites through global business cooperation," and added, "We are seeking to establish a raw material supply system to secure overseas base production bases and domestic economic feasibility.“

As BioMethanol is used as fuel for ships, it is attracting attention as a raw material for realizing carbon neutrality in the domestic and international marine industry. In particular, if DME is used as fuel after a simple structural change for diesel-powered ships, it is expected that it can be used as fuel for small and medium-sized ships.

However, in order to expand the supply and achieve the effectiveness of the project, it is necessary to have price competitiveness of clean methanol and clean DME, which have high initial investment costs. Accordingly, the government and local governments are calling on the government and local governments to introduce subsidies or incentives such as hydrogen for low-carbon eco-friendly fuels, and establish a public-private cooperation system to achieve net-zero goals by 2050.

Meanwhile, since last year, domestic industries have also been paying attention to eco-friendly certification to respond to climate change and realize decarbonization.

Conserving the global environment and actively responding to climate change is very encouraging, CEO Cho Won-jun said. "We expect carbon neutrality to be accelerated if government-level continuous support and local governments, including industrial groups, respond actively."

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