Going Green with
Pebax® Renew
Pebax Renew is a fairly common plastic in backcountry touring boots and just recently has appeared in at least one alpine boot as the Atomic Renu. What makes this plastic so interesting today is that Pebax Renew is made from Castor oil. The Castor plant is not edible and not normally grown on fertile land so it is not competing with food production.
Pebax Renew is the product of Arkema, a large international chemicals manufacturer that has been making vegetable-based plastics from Castor oil for 60 years. What is a little confusing is that Pebax is not the same as Pebax Renew. According to Arkema, Pebax has some impressive characteristics such as lightness and good fatique resistance but there is one problem—it’s made from fossil-based materials. But now Arkema has come up with Pebax Renew made with Castor oil, a totally renewable resource. They replaced the fossil-based molecules with those from a plant source. Not only is it free of fossil-based materials, Pebax Renew has all the positive traits of Pebax with even more temperature resistance and increased elasticity at low temps.
It’s an amazing material that is found in a wide range of products including sports shoes and snowshoes. Pebax seems to work anywhere a blend of thermoplastics and rubber is called for. It’s 20% lighter than other plastics, easy to work, has good flexible fatigue performance, good energy return for power transmission, UV resistance and outstanding properties at low temperatures.
So…. Pebax is a great light plastic but if it’s not Pebax Renew it’s not the green variety.
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