In order to take full advantage of the expanding electric vehicle market, Toray Industries plans to increase the capacity of Torayfan Oriented Polypropylene (OPP) film for automotive capacitors by 60% at its plant in Tsuchiura City, Ibaraki Prefecture by 2022. .
Compared with other plastic films, such as BOPET, Torayfan is a lighter plastic film. This material is tough, has excellent mechanical and electrical properties, and has a wide range of applications, including industrial, film capacitors, and packaging.
Torayfan is mainly used in film capacitors. Commonly used capacitors include: consumer electronics circuits, IT equipment and inverter circuits for electric vehicle motor power control units. In electric vehicle power control units (PCUs), film capacitors are relatively large components. Automakers call for the use of thinner standard capacitor films to achieve PCU weight reduction and miniaturization, improve driving performance and efficiency, and increase internal space and design flexibility. However, the problem of too thin a film often causes a reduction in voltage resistance. With its unique technology in maintaining material thinness and withstand voltage, Torayfan dominates the automotive capacitor film market.
Toray said: "In recent years, with people's increasing awareness of environmental issues, automobile emission regulations around the world are tightening. For cars using internal combustion engines, it has become increasingly difficult to meet regulatory requirements. "It is in this context that the demand for electric vehicles is expected to grow at a rate of 20% per year. From a geographical point of view, Europe and China are implementing stricter environmental legislation that will bring growth momentum.
At present, the market demand for automotive capacitors is growing. Toray's Tupura Plant's increased production capacity will help meet this demand.