Heng Huat Resources develops biomass products with global potential

Heng Huat Resources Group, one of Malaysia's leading manufacturers of biomass materials such as coconut fibre and oil palm empty fruit bunch (EFB) fibre, adds immense value to the global sustainability agenda with new applications. It has developed briquettes and fibre mats from oil palm EFB fibre, organic products that have groundbreaking potential in clean energy and disaster prevention.

"Palm fibre mats can be applied to prevent landslides and sandstorms," says Lim Ghim Chai, executive director. "Nowadays, a lot of cities are facing this problem. If they use palm fibre mats to cover the soil, grass would readily grow because this fibre mat could maintain moisture, unlike the conventional polymer-based geotextiles."

Meanwhile, palm briquettes can be used in coal-fired power plants as an eco-friendly and lower-cost alternative.

Heng Huat Resources is raising its annual oil palm EFB fibre production capacity to 130,000 tonnes over the next two years, adding seven lines to the existing 20 lines. The expansion includes setting up a new production factory equipped with a biomass co-generation power plant.

About 25 per cent of Heng Huat Resources' revenue comes from the sale of its own mattress brands, Fibre Star and Xiong Mao, distributed mainly in Malaysia.

In addition, it is one of China's leading biomass suppliers, shipping about 400 container loads monthly as it caters to the needs of mattress manufacturers on the mainland.