On September 28, 2025, Jinan, Shandong - With the world's first 10000 ton bio based silicone rubber production line officially put into operation in Dongying, Shandong, the organic silicon industry has officially entered the era of "zero carbon" materials. This project is jointly developed by the Institute of Process Engineering of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and Hesheng Silicon Industry. It uses rice husk to produce highly active silane technology, compressing the cost of biomass raw materials to 80% of the petroleum based route, marking China's global leadership in the field of organic silicon green manufacturing.


Technological Innovation: From "Oil Dependence" to "Biological Cycle"
Traditional silicone rubber production relies on metal silicon and methanol extracted from petroleum, with carbon emissions accounting for 65% of the entire lifecycle. Biobased silicone rubber extracts silica from rice husk ash and combines it with sugarcane based methanol to synthesize siloxane, reducing carbon dioxide emissions by 3.2 tons per ton of product. The "low-temperature catalytic cracking" process developed by the Chinese Academy of Sciences team has increased the extraction efficiency of silicon content in rice husks to 92%, which is 18 percentage points higher than similar foreign technologies.


Luo Liguo, Chairman of Hesheng Silicon Industry, said, "The project has signed long-term agreements with Brazilian sugarcane plantations and Southeast Asian rice husk suppliers to build a closed-loop industrial chain of 'agricultural waste biobased silicon materials high-end products'. It is estimated that the biobased route can reduce the production cost of silicone rubber to 18000 yuan/ton, which is 22% lower than petroleum based products, and reduce the risk of raw material price fluctuations by 40%.


Market Impact: Reshaping the Global Industrial Landscape
The large-scale production of bio based silicone rubber is triggering a profound transformation in the global silicone market. The EU's "Action Plan for High Quality Development of New Materials Industry in the 15th Five Year Plan" clearly requires that the mandatory recycling rate of silicone adhesive for building demolition should reach 60% by 2028, and bio based materials can perfectly meet the needs of circular economy. The pilot "trade in" recycling system in Guangzhou shows that the performance of recycled silicone rubber reaches 95% of the original raw material, but the cost is only 60% of it.


In the domestic market, bio based silicone rubber has achieved breakthroughs in the medical and electronic fields. The bio based thermal conductive silicone grease developed by Dongyue Group has a 30% increase in heat dissipation efficiency compared to traditional products and has successfully entered Huawei's 5G base station supply chain; Xin'an Corporation's bio based optical grade silicone has a light transmittance of 99.8% and has passed TSMC semiconductor packaging certification.


Policy driven: Green tariffs force technological upgrades
The "carbon footprint tracing" investigation launched by the European Union on Chinese photovoltaic adhesive products in 2025 reveals the urgent demand for low-carbon materials in the international market. According to the new EU regulations, from 2026 onwards, imported silicone products must provide a full lifecycle carbon footprint certificate, otherwise they will be subject to a 15% "green tariff". In this context, domestic enterprises are accelerating the layout of bio based routes:


Wanhua Chemical: Investing 1.2 billion yuan to build a bio based methanol project, with a plan to achieve 100% bio conversion of silicone rubber raw materials by 2026;
Xingfa Group: Relying on the abundant industrial silicon resources in Wuhai City, we have developed an integrated process of "diatomaceous earth biobased silane", which reduces costs by 18% compared to traditional routes;
Wacker Chemicals: Introducing German biobased siloxane technology at its factory in China, with plans to increase the proportion of biobased products to 30% by 2027.
Industry analysts point out that the popularity of bio based silicone rubber will reshape the global organic silicon competition landscape. It is expected that by 2028, China's production capacity of bio based silicon materials will account for 60% of the global total, driving the industry from "cost competition" to "technology carbon footprint" dual dimensional competition. With the "Panorama of Medical Organosilicon Market Access" predicting a 90% increase in the approval efficiency of three types of certificates by 2028, the penetration rate of bio based materials in the medical field is expected to exceed 50%, opening up a trillion dollar market space.