Materi’Act and Renault have brought plastics from end-of-life vehicles into series production for some of the car maker’s instrument panels, promoting automotive circularity.
Developed by Materi’Act for Renault, IniCycled-P is a polypropylene-based compound for visible applications, incorporating 20% recycled plastic from end-of-life vehicles, 15% talc filler and impact modification. The material is now in series production on the Renault Master.
The recycled material is sourced through GAIA, a subsidiary of The Future is Neutral, whose industrial ecosystem enables a closed-loop value chain. End-of-life vehicles are collected and dismantled by Indra, before materials are sorted, prepared and recycled by GAIA, then reintegrated into the automotive value chain.
A breakthrough for visible interior parts
The instrument panel is a demanding interior component, requiring high mechanical performance, aesthetic quality, durability and compliance with interior air-quality standards, while also playing a role in occupant safety during airbag deployment. IniCycled-P has been tested and shown to meet mechanical and safety requirements for instrument panels, including airbag deployment performance comparable to, and in some configurations exceeding, that of virgin polypropylene.
Compared with conventional polypropylene, IniCycled-P is reported to reduce carbon emissions by 24%, with a carbon footprint of 1.47kg CO2e per kilogram of material.
Designed for series production
The compound is fully compatible with standard injection molding processes and requires no equipment modification or process adjustment. From a production standpoint, it behaves like conventional polypropylene, making it a plug-and-play solution for automotive manufacturing. Crucially for light commercial vehicles, IniCycled-P combines aesthetics, performance and cost competitiveness, meeting OEM affordability requirements.
“IniCycled-P shows that recycled plastics from end-of-life vehicles can meet the highest standards for large, visible interior parts, even in series production, while remaining economically viable for OEMs and delivering outstanding performance, including in critical safety functions such as airbag deployment,” said Elise Moreau, the president of Materi’Act.
“By bringing materials from end-of-life vehicles (ELVs) back into the production of new vehicles, Renault Group is accelerating its recycling strategy while reaffirming its long-term commitment to a circular economy for the automotive sector,” commented Grégory Launay, sustainability product deployment director at Renault.
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