Since 2025, the hollow glass adhesive industry has shown development characteristics of "clear policy driving, optimized cost structure, and increasingly strict quality supervision" under the dual effects of the intensive implementation of green building materials policies in multiple sectors and the promotion of industrial chain autonomy. As a key supporting material for building energy-saving systems, the industry is transitioning from scale expansion to a high-quality development stage of "green compliance, efficient production, and controllable quality", providing basic support for carbon reduction and quality improvement in the construction industry.
The comprehensive implementation and effectiveness of the green building materials policy system. At the beginning of 2024, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and ten other departments jointly issued the "Implementation Plan for High Quality Development of Green Building Materials Industry", which clearly listed low VOC content building materials as key development directions, and proposed the goal of obtaining 12000 green building material product certification certificates and constructing more than 50 application demonstration projects by 2025. This policy promotes the accelerated green transformation of the insulating glass adhesive industry: In the certification field, as of the third quarter of 2025, the number of green building material certification certificates for insulating glass adhesives has reached 326, an increase of 68% compared to early 2024, covering major categories such as butyl rubber and silicone rubber; In terms of demonstration applications, key projects such as Beijing Urban Sub Center and Xiong'an New Area have included green certified insulating glass adhesive in the mandatory procurement list. Among them, a curtain wall project in Xiong'an New Area has purchased 800 tons of green certified two-component silicone adhesive in a single procurement. At the local level, the Yangtze River Delta region has taken the lead in establishing a green building materials procurement database, with over 150 insulated glass adhesive products in stock. In the first half of 2025, the proportion of certified product purchases in this region reached 62%, indicating a significant policy guidance effect.
Breakthroughs in industrial chain autonomy alleviate cost pressures. For a long time, the high-end silane coupling agents, special fillers and other raw materials required for the production of insulating glass adhesives have relied on imports, resulting in a high cost proportion. In recent years, domestic enterprises and research institutions have jointly achieved breakthroughs in key raw materials: a high-end silane coupling agent product developed by a chemical enterprise in Zhejiang has passed industry verification with a purity of 99.2%, which can replace imported similar products. By 2025, the production capacity has been increased to 5000 tons per year, reducing the procurement cost of related raw materials by 18%; A new material enterprise in Shandong has achieved mass production of nanoscale reinforcement fillers, with dispersibility and reinforcement performance reaching the international level of similar products, promoting a 12% improvement in downstream product mechanical properties while reducing the comprehensive cost of raw materials by 15%. In the upstream equipment field, a mechanical enterprise in Guangdong has launched a fully automatic two-component mixing production line, which controls the raw material ratio accuracy within ± 0.2% and improves production efficiency by 40% compared to traditional equipment. Currently, it has been put into use in 12 leading enterprises. The dual breakthroughs in raw materials and equipment have effectively alleviated the cost pressure in the industry, and the gross profit margin of enterprises above designated size in the first half of 2025 has increased by 3.5 percentage points compared to the same period in 2023.
Strengthening quality supervision promotes industry standardization and reshuffling. In response to the previous issues in the market, such as product performance being falsely labeled and environmental indicators not meeting standards, regulatory authorities have increased their inspection and rectification efforts. In the first half of 2025, the State Administration for Market Regulation organized a special quality inspection of insulating glass adhesive products, covering 156 enterprises in 28 provinces across the country. Key indicators such as VOCs emissions, tensile strength, and weather resistance were tested, and the pass rate of the inspection increased by 12 percentage points compared to 2023. However, 18 enterprises were still included in the key supervision list due to non-compliance with the indicators, and the related products have been suspended from government projects. At the same time, the self-discipline mechanism of the industry is gradually improving: the China Building Materials Federation has taken the lead in establishing a traceability platform for hollow glass adhesive products. Currently, 86 enterprises above designated size have joined, realizing the full process information of raw material procurement, production testing, and logistics delivery can be checked. Consumers can obtain complete traceability information by scanning the product QR code. The dual efforts of regulation and self-discipline have accelerated the reshuffle of the industry. From 2024 to the third quarter of 2025, a total of 53 small and medium-sized production capacity companies that do not meet environmental standards and have unstable quality have exited the market, further increasing industry concentration.
Segmented scenario requirements drive product function upgrades. Under the dual promotion of policies and the market, insulated glass adhesive products continue to iterate towards scenario based and functional directions. In response to the efficient construction needs of prefabricated buildings, the company has developed fast drying single component silicone adhesive, which shortens the surface drying time to less than 2 hours and adapts to the factory production rhythm of prefabricated components. Sales in the first half of 2025 increased by 55% year-on-year; In the field of Building Integrated Photovoltaics (BIPV), UV resistant butyl rubber products have passed a 10000 hour xenon lamp aging test with a performance degradation rate of less than 5%. They have been widely used in BIPV modules for enterprises such as Longi and JinkoSolar; Targeting the rural housing construction market, the company has launched an economical green certified butyl rubber, which is priced 22% lower than high-end products, while meeting basic sealing and environmental protection requirements. By 2025, the amount used in rural housing renovation projects in Shandong, Henan and other places will exceed 3000 tons. The continuous emergence of functional products has further expanded the boundaries of industry applications.
Industry experts say that the insulating glass adhesive industry has entered a stage of development that emphasizes both policy guidance and market drive. With the deepening implementation of green building materials policies and the improvement of industrial chain autonomy, the industry will further focus on the three directions of "low-carbon formula research and development, intelligent production upgrading, and full chain quality control". It is expected that by 2027, the proportion of green certified products in the total output of the industry will exceed 75%, and the self-sufficiency rate of key raw materials will reach over 90%. The industry as a whole will achieve a leap from "compliance standards" to "quality leadership", providing a more solid material guarantee for building energy conservation and green construction.
