Kuraray Co., Ltd. of Tokyo, announced Thursday that its Texas-based subsidiary, EVAL COMPANY OF AMERICA, has successfully completed trial operations for increasing the production of EVOH, an ethylene vinyl alcohol polymer resin, which the company markets under the trade name EVAL, utilizing newly expanded manufacturing facilities.
As a part of its plans to increase annual EVAL production by 24,000 tons annually, EVAL COMPANY OF AMERICA has begun production of an additional 12,000 tons, to 35,000 tons, making it the world's largest EVAL manufacturing facility.
Kuraray was the first to develop and commercialize the high-performance resin, which it launched in 1972. Kuraray currently maintains a 70% global market share.
The resin is used as a food packaging material, but the company has expanded its applications to include use as a fuel gas effluent control in automobile fuel tanks.
In addition to EVAL COMPANY OF AMERICA, Kuraray’s EVAL manufacturing facilities include a plant in Okayama, Tokyo, with 10,000 tons per year capacity and EVAL EUROPE N.V., Belgium, with 24,000 tons per year.
At Thursday's opening ceremony of the newly expanded plant, Yasuaki Wakui, president of Kuraray, emphasized the importance of environmental awareness in the Group’s operations and said that the state-of-the-art EVAL manufacturing facility will enable the company to reduce its emission of volatile organic compounds.