Final Report - WOODY (Innovative advanced Wood-based Composite Materials and Components)
Currently the world of polymeric composite materials is almost exclusively based on fossil derived components. This fact represents a strong issue, as the non-renewable global oil resources are being exploited year after year, also as a consequence of the ever growing demand for plastics engineering materials. Against the current problem and limitations in resources, the possibility to exploit natural renewable resources as building block for structural materials has been highlighted as a basis for ensuring a sustainable future to the composites sector.
The WOODY project developed new composite panels and laminates from wood derived renewable materials. The developed materials can provide competitive performances with respect to traditional composites. The WOODY project, particularly, focused on introducing an innovative paradigm in the composite industry, thanks to development of materials derived from natural resources, enabling to cover the whole necessities of components: fibre, matrix and core. Enzymatic processes have been developed partly in parallel and partly as a functional complement to chemo-thermo-mechanical treatments, to achieve a higher throughput and eco-sustainability to the process. At the same time, the process provided advanced functionalities to the materials developed for the different parts of the composite material. Textile processing is furthermore suited to the innovative range of materials developed in order to achieve functional parts. Such parts are applicable into products to be developed at full scale providing reliable and almost repeatable performances.
The breakthrough innovation in materials is backed by an innovative approach in design of composite products, the so called 'composite thinking', starting from the phase of conception, to the production and installation, and backed to the modeling enabled virtual simulation. This approach enables to rethink products and fully exploiting the potentialities of composites. The quality of the approach is based on multidisciplinary research targeting the whole bio-composite value-chain.
The project results and achievements have been applied in 15 demonstrators. They constitute a practical way to transform into real scale application and products the technical results of WOODY project.
As a whole, WOODY has set the basis for the development of a new class of products, optimising the use of the natural resources. Such approach is therefore expected to increase the tendency for wild forest areas recovery, and to promote the culture of wooden species suitable for the production of renewable composite materials.
Project context and objectives:
Project context
The WOODY project goal is to develop new composite materials and products from wood-derived renewable materials, providing performances competitive with traditional composites.
The project involves fundamental research aspects, material development, carried out from universities and research and development (R&D) centres, market analysis and product development studies, under the industrial leadership. The combined results ensured to address real market needs and to finalise R&D activities into products with a real potential.
Coordinated efforts of 18 partners across Europe led to breakthrough results in implementing lightweight natural derived composite materials in different key sectors, such as automotive and building. Stakeholders, representing the complete value chain from raw materials producers up to final end users, cooperated with the consortium to exploit the results achieved.
During the project, technological development has targeted different material components (resins, matrixes, cores, fibres) and on the composite processing methodology, specifically developed to operate with the innovative materials. Integrated research approach enabled to achieve high quality performance targets.
Particular attention during the project has been dedicated to novel design philosophy: the 'composite thinking' of the bio-composite materials developed. The incorporation in the design process of aesthetic feature has also been considered, in order to maximise the market potential for WOODY demonstrators. Such approach, developed under the leadership of industrial partners, proved its effectiveness generating concrete business opportunities for partners, and leading to the development of products with market appeal. Favourable environmental impact, in terms of reduced carbon footprint and resources depletion potential are among the added values and buying drivers for natural derived products.
Project objectives
The WOODY project objectives can be identified as a set of enabling materials and processing technologies towards the final bio-composite products. In details, the following project objectives are defined for the different areas of research:
Raw materials:
- extraction of cellulose fibrils from wood, suitable to improve the performances of textiles and to constitute intermediate for the creation of nanostructured materials;
- identification of processes for high yield production of Furfural from biomass and its modification to comply with the composites requirements and the natural derived fibres;
- selection and development of nano-based natural components for functionalising wood based materials.
Treatments:
- identification and development of light chemical treatment of cellulose to remove lignin and other extractives before fibrillation step;
- identification and development of chemical treatment to remove the amorphous regions from cellulose fibrils / microcrystalline cellulose to isolate the crystalline part of cellulose (whisker);
- development of enzymatic recombined CBD based pretreatments for nanofibril production with combined functionalising process, enabling to fuse protein-mineral constituents;
- development of treatments for nano fibril and whiskers separation, relying on chemo-mechanical and thermal treatments with high throughput;
- development of recombinant enzymatic treatment to increase the quality of the fibrils-to-fibre build-up, leading to fibrous material suitable for the textile reinforcements of the composite laminates;
- development of treatments or material formulation enabling to limit the moisture sensitivity of the composites;
- textile processing, enabling to cost-effectively transform the fibres into yarns, webs, woven or knitted textiles producing improved reinforcing elements for laminates.
Composite materials:
- development and manufacture of laminate panels with innovative reinforcement fabric and matrix material based on furfural thermoset resin. Results take into account suitable additives promoting fibre-matrix bonding, fire suppression, moisture resistance and other types of functional properties;
- development and manufacture of sandwich panels with advanced constitutive elements, such as foamed core based on different products concepts, furfural foam (expanded or syntactic) and furfural impregnating three-dimensional (3D) natural derived (non-woven or textile) structures. Skin layers and adhesion promoting agents, have also been considered.
Software design tool:
- development of a modular platform to support the design of the composite materials and parts;
- development of a knowledge repository module, suitable to collect the knowledge generated within the different fields of research, starting from materials constituents, up to composites and structures, parts and assemblies;
- integration within the platform of a conceptual design module, enclosing data manager systems. Functions include retrieval of materials data from repository and interface to the calculus systems, providing basic design of the materials as well as decision support for the composite structure;
- integration within the platform of a composite calculation module suitable to provide behavioral simulation of the composites;
- integrate the platform with a composites design module, representing the last step to provide output to the designer of materials and composite parts. The system provides guidelines for optimisation, based on multiple parameters suitable to address the different needs according to the user priorities.
Project results:
Main science and technology (S&T) results / foregrounds
WOODY project results are in the following resumed in a short overview, presenting the scientific research and industrial development achievements. The main objective and the most relevant achievement of the WOODY project was to proof the feasibility of the introduction of natural derived materials into the world of industrial composites. This has been achieved and proven in demonstrators of different types of materials and real scale systems, covering a wide span of processes, addressing extended types of products and demonstrating applicability to different industrial sectors and markets.
Scientific results
The logical flow of the WOODY project deployed along the different elements constituting the composite materials: the core, the textile elements serving as reinforcements, the resins and the additives serving to accomplish the processing at industrial scale.
Materials, although extremely differentiated, have in common one relevant feature: the fact they are derived from natural resources. This is already a valid starting point, though a further step is required: they have to be integrated within the industrial process, enabling the production of products with comparable performances to traditional composites.
Having ensured this starting layer, strong research intensity permit the up-scaling from the nano-size to the macro material scale, therefore supporting the future industrial exploitation. In WOODY project, the link from the fundamental research to the industry constituted an evident added value, and was behind the capability to achieve target results. The scientific objectives identified by the following items can be reported:
- cellulose nano filaments, either fibrils and crystals;
- resin-fibres interaction;
- natural polymer extruded core.
Cellulose nanofibrils
Research has been mainly conducted on two topics, and two different morphological types of cellulose:
- nano fibrillated cellulose (NFC), with a partial content of amorphous cellulose and at a typical dimension of 20 - 50 nm diameter and length 1 to 5 micron, obtained by chemical and mechanical fibrillation;
- nano crystalline cellulose (NCC), completely crystalline cellulose, obtained by chemical and enzymatic approach, typical diameter in the order of 10 nm and length 100 to 400 nm.
Studies on NFC performed by LTU have been initially targeted to the set-up of the processing and optimisation of the steps needed to achieve the cellulose fibrils in reproducible conditions.
Afterwards, development proceeded towards the achievement of a complete overview of the different types of wood and their influence on the NFC final products. The process efficiency in terms of energy consumption has been overlooked as well, providing a detailed vision on the influence different steps of production has on the final materials performances. The incidence on the use of different types of enzymatic treatments on process energetic and final materials performances was assessed as well.
Further testing has been performed on nanopapers obtained with the aforementioned fibrillated cellulose, as a potential basis for composites, or as a new material in itself, to be exploited e.g. in filtration or as a template for further chemical or physical processing.
Studies on NCC performed in HUJ targeted the exploitation of the extremely high surface energy and self assembling capabilities of the extra-pure cellulose whiskers, to produce a totally new type of aerogels. The process has been refined in several steps during the course of the project, finalised to the achievement of the best performances and shape reproducibility at the micro-meso order.
The self assembly has been effected through a functionalisation of the NCC whiskers via different types of binding domains, oriented to couple with cellulosic substrates (flax, hemp, cotton...) or to synthetic fibres (glass, carbon). From a practical standpoint, the surface finishing and sizing additives, common in commercially available fibres, have proven to be an issue to be solved to ensure the quality of the final processing and treatment.
Results of the activities on aerogel have brought to the deposition of patents from the HUJ, and the creation of a spin-off company (Melodea) to commercial exploitation.
Resin-fibre interaction
The development of real scale composites consisted of optimisation of the processing of composite laminates and of the processing parameters of especially the furan resin. Being water based, furan has since ever provided difficulties in the processing, due to the formation of blisters and voids related to vapour formation, and in-body water formation due to the chemistry of polymer condensation. The presence of natural fibres as reinforcements has hindered the application of the furan as matrix, in reason of swelling behavior with the excess water present and generated. Within the first two years of the project, coordinated research efforts led to the reduction of the initial water content in the resin, from more than 20 % to less than 9 %, keeping adequate levels of viscosity. This was achieved thanks to the extensive work brought ahead from DTU in cooperation with TFC, Sicomp and APC. The complete theoretical analysis of the phenomena has been derived from well established scientific literature, matched and adapted to the experimental results. Review of the methods and simulation, applied to the case under analysis, are relevant for the following process of optimisation of the use of furan resin materials as matrixes for composites.
Results permitted to achieve a complete vision on the physical phenomena occurring during the process, and to address the operational parameters, especially in the different types of infusion, and reactive resin transfer processes. Chemo-rheology and flow behaviour models are developed, implemented in different types of models, and further exploited in the processing.
Particular micro-tests set up has been developed furthermore to enable understanding the level of adhesion of the resin to the different types of fibre substrates, through fibre pull-out tests.
Natural polymer extruded cores
The development of bio-based thermoplastic core materials to be exploited in the composites processing has been pursued by VTT. Activities were organised into two main research areas:
- setup of the new tandem line equipment exploiting PP and PS polymers;
- implementation of PLA and other polymers physical foaming in the tandem line.
The tandem extrusion line equipment has been installed in VTT facilities and is operating since March 2012. The modifications and the compound development done by VTT were successful and the extrusion process could be stabilised to produce extruded foams with density between 55 and 170 kg/m3, for PS and PLA, respectively. Besides the polystyrene used in the initial running-in trials, extrusion experiments were conducted with different qualities of polylactic acid, cellulose acetate and polybutylene succinate.
Technological results
Research results applied into practical systems, and constituting the bridge towards the industrialisation represents the practical outcome of the WOODY project. They are listed below and described in details in the following paragraphs, providing as well the final objectives of industrial exploitation:
- yarn processing;
- fire-proof furan resin;
- foamed nanocellulose;
- composite panels;
- water based mould release agent;
- simulation tools;
- composite elements and parts.
Yarn processing
The efforts in the fibre processing are focused on two types of processing:
- formation of continuous natural derived polymer yarns, reinforced by cellulose nanofibres via melt extrusion process;
- functionalising natural fibres based yarns with cellulose nanofibres (surface treatment of cellulosic raw materials).
Fibre processing trials performed by CENTEXBEL by extruding a continuous PLA filament yarn with 0.5 wt% CNW, showed partially good results. Limits to the following exploitation and marketing activities are to be addressed to solve current issues in terms of:
- low tenacity and high strain, probably due to decrease in molecular weight (PLA degradation due to non-optimal residence time under the extrusion conditions);
- degradation triggered by the surface chemistry of CNW (acidic residuals);
- possibly presence of CNW aggregates can further decrease the performances.
Degradation has been detected in the resulting filament, caused by the drying (80 °C) process after the powder mixing. As the pre-compound powder is not yet stabilised, inhibitors suitable to avoid problems in the polymer processing steps have been identified and added during the compounding. The compounding process at 200 °C presented lower water content and limited degradation, proving the effectiveness of actions taken, and good potential for future product optimisation.
Fire-proof furan resin
The improvement in terms of fire resistance of the furan-based composite panels has been achieved as a result of a combined process and formulation development of the resin. Results on fire resistant resin has been achieved on top of the low water content furan formulations developed within the first part of the project. TFC efforts in improving the formulation of the resin for both fire resistance and workability has been performed in close relation and synergy with the composite transformer partners, in order to achieve a product with performances considerably improved in respect to standard synthetic resins, and definitely better than any other natural derived material. Among partners, especially APC has provided the key basis and requirements for the processing development, and APM for the furan products exploiting the fire resistance.
The developed resin was used as matrix material and hot pressed with a natural fibre mat. The results of fire testing on manufactured panels proved successful results, the partner TFC is committed to exploit after the WOODY project to further support the development of products and to address differentiated markets.
Jointly with the manufacturer APC, TFC has developed a resin (code number 050915RF) which is expected to provide the best results. The furan resin 050915RF has been exploited by APM to build a sample containers in order to assess the fire resistance and the process easiness. Composite panels deriving from such resin were extensively exposed to a fire source, proving that after the end of the test the parts maintained almost unaltered the mechanical properties.
Other partners as LIND and VOLVO already planned to exploit it into new classes of parts and semi-finished products, in reason of extremely reduced VOC emissions. The material characteristics have been appreciated by the manufacturers, especially the improvement in terms of workers safety and health with respect to traditional resins, as a reason for the expected future applications.
Foamed nanocellulose
Thanks to the specific actions oriented to the functionalisation of the NCC materials and the joint efforts from HUJ and APC, a structural core for composites that is as well entirely composed of renewable materials has been developed. The discovery of the capability for a nanostructured suspension of NCC in water to self-assemble and to expel the liquid upon freeze-drying condition has been the trigger to develop an aerogel-like structure which is contemporarily lightweight and stiff. The process is completed with the infiltration of the aerogel NCC structure with furan resin, leading to the composite foam that has provided relevant properties in terms of stiffness and light weight.
The activities of research following the basic discovery of the phenomenon has been oriented to the resolution of technological issues finalised to the development of a material that can have product capabilities: customisation of performances, optimisation of the density and verification of performances under real composite core applications.
The exploitation of such result has been put forward thanks to the establishment of a spin-off company from the HUJ, (MELODEA) deputed to the technological development, product implementation, and ultimately the commercial contacts with potential customers and joint developers. In parallel, technical development is forecast to be oriented to the process volumes extension, to upscale pilot plants at the scale of some kg batch and therefore increase the appeal for investments - processing.
Composite panels
The 'composite thinking' approach has been applied in the development of composite elements and parts that can benefit from the performances of the raw materials, and from the reduced needs for further processing. The development of panels (either laminate elements or sandwich ones) is provided with a combination of the different cellulose based textile reinforcements (knitted, woven or roving mats based) and natural traditional cores (balsa wood) or expanded natural derived materials. The panels have been exploited to perform mechanical testing, benchmarking performances against traditional composites, and to support the different functionalities achievable. The aesthetic characterisation is considered as a fundamental added value, to enable direct application into a product development, and to reduce the finishing procedures and costs associated. The composite transformers are already during the course of the project working to exploit such characterisation into new applications. Final results are expected to be applicable from a wide span of potential customers in the automotive or shipbuilding sectors.
Water based mould release agent
The work performed by MARBO focus on the development of the Marbocote WOODY release agent. In particular, activities are focusing on the set-up of the formulation, with specific additives (wetting agents, preservatives...) to ensure applicability, stability against bacteria proliferation in particular conditions and adequate pot life.
The new formulation required an updated evaluation of the stability of the complete formula, completed according to the ISO 20783-1:2011 standard.
Once the formulation was almost completed, a new production procedure was defined to grant the requested performances, and accordingly facilities upgraded. The result enabled to define the correct parameters and the improvement of the working parameters (temperature, pressure, stirring, separation steps, timing and sufficient batch volumes...).
Mould release testing was performed on various substrate (moulds) and in contact with different resins. The results proved to be positive with the different resins and substrates, with a particular positive effect on standard mould materials (composite and metal moulds), not suitable on water sensitive moulds (wood and MDF ones).
On the basis of such positive results, the activity of MARBO after the project is already oriented to get to a final product to industrial customers and to ensure applicability into several industrial fields. As a first market, MARBO is addressing sectors in which environmental, worker's health (and costs) concerns for the solvent-based solutions are higher, for example the wind energy sector.
Simulation tools
Modelling software, based on classical composites theory, has been designed and programmed to be as transversal as possible across the different composite materials applications, in order to be further expandable after the project completion, and updatable on the basis of the different and new materials. The tool provides a platform covering all the aspects of the composite material development, from the raw materials to the final structural analysis, enabling comparison of different solutions and information on the processing and the materials.
Eight modules are available for the tool, as resulting from the WOODY development. They cover the knowledge repository module, the conceptual and the composite design modules. Materials LCA data, carbon footprint and cost aspects, as well as a decision support system providing methods for selection of the appropriate materials as a function of the expected functionalities are embedded in the decision support. The platform is expected to be exploited at first through composite associations' websites or group of interests, being a good and practical alternative tool for composite designers and engineers, compared to more expensive and robust, but complex solutions available in the market.
The material database exploits both commercial data and the data of the lab tests got from the research partners, covering fibres, resins, cores, additives and integrated composites.
Composite elements and parts
A wide span of products, or parts in composite materials deriving from the WOODY materials and design indications have been developed: skis, showcase for permanent exhibition, tanks and prefabricated modules, as well as parts for the transportation field, as well as pre-pregs to be shaped in compression moulding. In particular, in the following the results of the wind blades for transportation sector are described, as a showcase with a potential follow-up and upscaling.
Composite wind blades reinforced with different textiles have been tested and characterised mechanically in order to evaluate the performance of different technological solutions. In particular the three reinforcing textiles assessed are:
- carbon fibre;
- flax fibre;
- mix of carbon and flax.
The three materials have been assessed with different textures in order to evaluate the most performing solution for the blade manufacturing. For all the sample, the resin material was chosen to be the SuperSap 100/1000 produced by Entropy Resins (United States (US)), which is 48 % bio-based, as the furan resin at the stage of development was not suitable for the specific features of vacuum bagging moulding. The final application of the wind blade is a particular prototype of wind propelled vehicle that represented DTU to a contest of zero emission prototypes.
Layup of the fibres and the textile layers has been optimised through modelling systems. The materials (small samples and full parts) have been tested and fully characterised to achieve a clear view on the impact of the materials selection on the final performances.
The final selection is a mix of flax and carbon fibres, providing optimal trade-off between the weight and the mechanical performances, and contributing significantly to reduce the final cost of the blade.
Potential impact, main dissemination activities and exploitation of results
Project potential impact
The research and development activities, and associated achievements in terms of industrial technologies, materials and industrialisation, represent a proof of the results achievable thanks to European level cooperation involving the key stakeholders. Already established contacts with intelligent manufacturing systems (IMS) organisation put the basis for international cooperation at worldwide level and extended the impact potentiality of the project.
This approach permitted to address the challenges foreseen within WOODY project and to translate the results directly into procedures applicable by end users and composites processor partners.
The European dimension of the project supported its final objective to develop and promote entirely natural resources based materials, suitable for a wide portfolio of applications. In many cases, the project results have been of a suitable quality to be directly addressing the market.
EuCIA/EuPC partner is in direct contact with about 51 European plastics converting national and European industry associations, representing close to 50 000 companies, producing over 45 million tons of plastic products every year. More than 1.6 million people are working in those companies to create a turnover in excess of EUR 280 billion per year. It is supposed that a share of 10 % (about 5000 companies) can potentially be interested in the WOODY outputs. Though, due to the non-direct link between EuPC and the companies, and in order to provide a limited scenario, it is expected that a small number of companies will enter into direct contact with the WOODY results. Taking into account a pessimistic hypothesis that only the 1 % of the European composite industry companies are interested to adopt WOODY based technology, still a huge number of companies (500) would still be reached, generating turnover and further multiplying the products outreach. Such numbers of possible clients are expected to generate an increasing turnover for both the industry and the knowledge centers involved in the project.
WOODY results are expected to address a number of European Commission directives:
- Promoting employment, by identifying new business opportunities for the partners widening and differentiating their product offering. No discrimination on genders is expected, thanks to the intrinsic variety of the intended services and products;
- Qualifying jobs: moving the business of partners towards new opportunities of higher added value and pursuing highly qualified jobs;
- Promoting a healthier working environment: by introducing water based, volatile organic compound (VOC) free products, by introducing natural-based materials and by creating a new range of products made from scraps, thus favouring a sustainable industrial production and promoting a conscious exploitation of resources.
Main dissemination activities
Having a strong connection to the European composite research and industrial network, WOODY partners, participated to a wide range of events. Public articles, presentation at TAPPI, JEC, Composites Europe and other fairs, the demonstration elements installed in Stockholm Museum and other public locations, contacts with international stakeholders, contributed to generate awareness against the wide public and interested entities. In the following some of the main events are briefly outlined.
Brindisi workshop: A final public workshop was organised by the WOODY partners in the facilities of CETMA to disseminate the achievements and spread the use of bio-based materials in the composite industry. The event included short presentations of project results and lab-working sessions. Especially company active in wind blade manufacturing showed great interest to the event. Ten external companies, highly interested in the processing and transformation of composite materials participated to the event.
Euronews equipe participated to the workshop. The event was used to create a video on the WOODY project. Several interviews and shoots were realised creating a story to show the project development and the results obtained. (Video attached to the final reporting and available at http://www.euronews.com/2013/01/28/cooking-up-natural-plastics/ online).
Industrial Technologies 2012: by participating to Industrial Technologies 2012, WOODY met over 160 high profile international speakers from industry, government and research, discussing visions for European research and industry towards 2020. WOODY project was selected to be in the shortlist of 10 projects competing for the final award and was presented by Andrea Ferrari to the whole assembly.
BiPoCo 2012: Together with other two concurrent projects involved in the development of materials from natural resources (BIO-STRUCT and FORBIOPLAST), WOODY has been partner in the organisation of the 2012 Conference on Bio-Based Polymers and Composites (Bi.Po.Co) held in Siofok (Hungary). The event (see http://www.bipoco2012.hu for details) collected the interest of a wide panel of researchers, experts and industries, involved in the plastic and composite field that are looking with high commitment to the bio-based alternative.
International Conference on Polymer and Textile Biotechnology: WOODY project was presented at the Seventh International Conference on Polymer and Textile Biotechnology organised in Milan. Andrea Ferrari (DAPP) was invited to give a speech about bio-based materials and their exploitation into composites.
COMPOTEC: WOODY presented at CETMA booth in COMPOTEC fair. Compotec is the first exhibition in Italy entirely dedicated to research, production, making up and technologies of composite materials. It's a new and unique event in the Italian trade fair panorama: its target is to bring together universities, research institutes, industries, organisations and media in a three days event in order to present the composite technologies, processes and developments. The exhibition, at its fourth edition, has registered the presence of 125 exhibitors covering a surface of 5000 sqmt.
Exploitable results
The WOODY project is aiming to creating a range of opportunities, at different levels, from knowledge and materials to end-user applications. All of them have exploitation potential, and have been listed and described within the PUEK document. They are outlined below:
- Materials: The project will generate valuable performance information from the materials tested and used in the project. Additionally, new composite materials could be developed, of applicability for a wider range of structural materials, and exploitable beyond the scope of the project. Research institutions can transfer the knowledge generated in the project to their own industrial areas of influence, promoting a wider use of wood based composites in the construction and other industries.
- Formulations: The formulations developed in the project can facilitate the licensing to third parties, and contribute to create a supply chain, as well as to generate demand.
- Prototypal elements, in particular for the construction and transportation industry: these are the most immediate end user sectors of application and several available concepts and prototypes constitute already a good base for exploitation, but the areas of application are already widening to furniture, pre-fabricated modules, etc.;
- Software: The design tool and the knowledge repository can help engineers to identify the materials, and to find new applications for the future, exploiting a wide classification and multivariable-based decisional approaches.
A list of all the exploitable outcomes of the project is provided in the following, as extracted from the 'Plan for use and exploitation of knowledge' (PUEK) document in its definitive version, D10.35 issued 31 December 2012. They have been grouped according to exploitation cluster and analyzed in detail.
- Eco-compatible NFC materials, according to improvement and refinement of traditional methods
- NCC materials extracted from paper industry wastes with enzyme treatment based on CBD
- Industrial upscaled resin extraction technologies
- Tailor made furan resin formulations for the specific applications
- Nano-cellulose modified biopolymer formulations
- Surface functionalisation of textiles using CBD and nano-cellulose formulations
- Modified textile processing, enabling to cost-effectively transform the fibres into yarns, webs, woven or knitted textiles
- Innovative core materials starting from natural based polymers, either derived from PLA or starch
- Core development process technology
- Matrix material based on furfural polymer
- Nanobased natural components for functionalising the wood based materials (anti-flame, foaming, adhesion promoting, ultraviolet (UV) blocking etc.)
- Injection mouldable technopolymers - nanocellulose composites
- Prototypes / pre-industrial laminate
- Prototypes / pre-industrial sandwich panel
- Ready-to-market natural based composites exploiting WOODY results
- Textile structures for green walls application
- Project knowledge base
- Design tool: Software based design support, structural module and decisional support modules
- Product life cycle analysis
- Training materials and activities
- Architectural composite structures for interiors and exteriors
- Semi-permanent release agents.
Project website: http://www.woodyproject.eu
The WOODY project developed new composite panels and laminates from wood derived renewable materials. The developed materials can provide competitive performances with respect to traditional composites. The WOODY project, particularly, focused on introducing an innovative paradigm in the composite industry, thanks to development of materials derived from natural resources, enabling to cover the whole necessities of components: fibre, matrix and core. Enzymatic processes have been developed partly in parallel and partly as a functional complement to chemo-thermo-mechanical treatments, to achieve a higher throughput and eco-sustainability to the process. At the same time, the process provided advanced functionalities to the materials developed for the different parts of the composite material. Textile processing is furthermore suited to the innovative range of materials developed in order to achieve functional parts. Such parts are applicable into products to be developed at full scale providing reliable and almost repeatable performances.
The breakthrough innovation in materials is backed by an innovative approach in design of composite products, the so called 'composite thinking', starting from the phase of conception, to the production and installation, and backed to the modeling enabled virtual simulation. This approach enables to rethink products and fully exploiting the potentialities of composites. The quality of the approach is based on multidisciplinary research targeting the whole bio-composite value-chain.
The project results and achievements have been applied in 15 demonstrators. They constitute a practical way to transform into real scale application and products the technical results of WOODY project.
As a whole, WOODY has set the basis for the development of a new class of products, optimising the use of the natural resources. Such approach is therefore expected to increase the tendency for wild forest areas recovery, and to promote the culture of wooden species suitable for the production of renewable composite materials.
Project context and objectives:
Project context
The WOODY project goal is to develop new composite materials and products from wood-derived renewable materials, providing performances competitive with traditional composites.
The project involves fundamental research aspects, material development, carried out from universities and research and development (R&D) centres, market analysis and product development studies, under the industrial leadership. The combined results ensured to address real market needs and to finalise R&D activities into products with a real potential.
Coordinated efforts of 18 partners across Europe led to breakthrough results in implementing lightweight natural derived composite materials in different key sectors, such as automotive and building. Stakeholders, representing the complete value chain from raw materials producers up to final end users, cooperated with the consortium to exploit the results achieved.
During the project, technological development has targeted different material components (resins, matrixes, cores, fibres) and on the composite processing methodology, specifically developed to operate with the innovative materials. Integrated research approach enabled to achieve high quality performance targets.
Particular attention during the project has been dedicated to novel design philosophy: the 'composite thinking' of the bio-composite materials developed. The incorporation in the design process of aesthetic feature has also been considered, in order to maximise the market potential for WOODY demonstrators. Such approach, developed under the leadership of industrial partners, proved its effectiveness generating concrete business opportunities for partners, and leading to the development of products with market appeal. Favourable environmental impact, in terms of reduced carbon footprint and resources depletion potential are among the added values and buying drivers for natural derived products.
Project objectives
The WOODY project objectives can be identified as a set of enabling materials and processing technologies towards the final bio-composite products. In details, the following project objectives are defined for the different areas of research:
Raw materials:
- extraction of cellulose fibrils from wood, suitable to improve the performances of textiles and to constitute intermediate for the creation of nanostructured materials;
- identification of processes for high yield production of Furfural from biomass and its modification to comply with the composites requirements and the natural derived fibres;
- selection and development of nano-based natural components for functionalising wood based materials.
Treatments:
- identification and development of light chemical treatment of cellulose to remove lignin and other extractives before fibrillation step;
- identification and development of chemical treatment to remove the amorphous regions from cellulose fibrils / microcrystalline cellulose to isolate the crystalline part of cellulose (whisker);
- development of enzymatic recombined CBD based pretreatments for nanofibril production with combined functionalising process, enabling to fuse protein-mineral constituents;
- development of treatments for nano fibril and whiskers separation, relying on chemo-mechanical and thermal treatments with high throughput;
- development of recombinant enzymatic treatment to increase the quality of the fibrils-to-fibre build-up, leading to fibrous material suitable for the textile reinforcements of the composite laminates;
- development of treatments or material formulation enabling to limit the moisture sensitivity of the composites;
- textile processing, enabling to cost-effectively transform the fibres into yarns, webs, woven or knitted textiles producing improved reinforcing elements for laminates.
Composite materials:
- development and manufacture of laminate panels with innovative reinforcement fabric and matrix material based on furfural thermoset resin. Results take into account suitable additives promoting fibre-matrix bonding, fire suppression, moisture resistance and other types of functional properties;
- development and manufacture of sandwich panels with advanced constitutive elements, such as foamed core based on different products concepts, furfural foam (expanded or syntactic) and furfural impregnating three-dimensional (3D) natural derived (non-woven or textile) structures. Skin layers and adhesion promoting agents, have also been considered.
Software design tool:
- development of a modular platform to support the design of the composite materials and parts;
- development of a knowledge repository module, suitable to collect the knowledge generated within the different fields of research, starting from materials constituents, up to composites and structures, parts and assemblies;
- integration within the platform of a conceptual design module, enclosing data manager systems. Functions include retrieval of materials data from repository and interface to the calculus systems, providing basic design of the materials as well as decision support for the composite structure;
- integration within the platform of a composite calculation module suitable to provide behavioral simulation of the composites;
- integrate the platform with a composites design module, representing the last step to provide output to the designer of materials and composite parts. The system provides guidelines for optimisation, based on multiple parameters suitable to address the different needs according to the user priorities.
Project results:
Main science and technology (S&T) results / foregrounds
WOODY project results are in the following resumed in a short overview, presenting the scientific research and industrial development achievements. The main objective and the most relevant achievement of the WOODY project was to proof the feasibility of the introduction of natural derived materials into the world of industrial composites. This has been achieved and proven in demonstrators of different types of materials and real scale systems, covering a wide span of processes, addressing extended types of products and demonstrating applicability to different industrial sectors and markets.
Scientific results
The logical flow of the WOODY project deployed along the different elements constituting the composite materials: the core, the textile elements serving as reinforcements, the resins and the additives serving to accomplish the processing at industrial scale.
Materials, although extremely differentiated, have in common one relevant feature: the fact they are derived from natural resources. This is already a valid starting point, though a further step is required: they have to be integrated within the industrial process, enabling the production of products with comparable performances to traditional composites.
Having ensured this starting layer, strong research intensity permit the up-scaling from the nano-size to the macro material scale, therefore supporting the future industrial exploitation. In WOODY project, the link from the fundamental research to the industry constituted an evident added value, and was behind the capability to achieve target results. The scientific objectives identified by the following items can be reported:
- cellulose nano filaments, either fibrils and crystals;
- resin-fibres interaction;
- natural polymer extruded core.
Cellulose nanofibrils
Research has been mainly conducted on two topics, and two different morphological types of cellulose:
- nano fibrillated cellulose (NFC), with a partial content of amorphous cellulose and at a typical dimension of 20 - 50 nm diameter and length 1 to 5 micron, obtained by chemical and mechanical fibrillation;
- nano crystalline cellulose (NCC), completely crystalline cellulose, obtained by chemical and enzymatic approach, typical diameter in the order of 10 nm and length 100 to 400 nm.
Studies on NFC performed by LTU have been initially targeted to the set-up of the processing and optimisation of the steps needed to achieve the cellulose fibrils in reproducible conditions.
Afterwards, development proceeded towards the achievement of a complete overview of the different types of wood and their influence on the NFC final products. The process efficiency in terms of energy consumption has been overlooked as well, providing a detailed vision on the influence different steps of production has on the final materials performances. The incidence on the use of different types of enzymatic treatments on process energetic and final materials performances was assessed as well.
Further testing has been performed on nanopapers obtained with the aforementioned fibrillated cellulose, as a potential basis for composites, or as a new material in itself, to be exploited e.g. in filtration or as a template for further chemical or physical processing.
Studies on NCC performed in HUJ targeted the exploitation of the extremely high surface energy and self assembling capabilities of the extra-pure cellulose whiskers, to produce a totally new type of aerogels. The process has been refined in several steps during the course of the project, finalised to the achievement of the best performances and shape reproducibility at the micro-meso order.
The self assembly has been effected through a functionalisation of the NCC whiskers via different types of binding domains, oriented to couple with cellulosic substrates (flax, hemp, cotton...) or to synthetic fibres (glass, carbon). From a practical standpoint, the surface finishing and sizing additives, common in commercially available fibres, have proven to be an issue to be solved to ensure the quality of the final processing and treatment.
Results of the activities on aerogel have brought to the deposition of patents from the HUJ, and the creation of a spin-off company (Melodea) to commercial exploitation.
Resin-fibre interaction
The development of real scale composites consisted of optimisation of the processing of composite laminates and of the processing parameters of especially the furan resin. Being water based, furan has since ever provided difficulties in the processing, due to the formation of blisters and voids related to vapour formation, and in-body water formation due to the chemistry of polymer condensation. The presence of natural fibres as reinforcements has hindered the application of the furan as matrix, in reason of swelling behavior with the excess water present and generated. Within the first two years of the project, coordinated research efforts led to the reduction of the initial water content in the resin, from more than 20 % to less than 9 %, keeping adequate levels of viscosity. This was achieved thanks to the extensive work brought ahead from DTU in cooperation with TFC, Sicomp and APC. The complete theoretical analysis of the phenomena has been derived from well established scientific literature, matched and adapted to the experimental results. Review of the methods and simulation, applied to the case under analysis, are relevant for the following process of optimisation of the use of furan resin materials as matrixes for composites.
Results permitted to achieve a complete vision on the physical phenomena occurring during the process, and to address the operational parameters, especially in the different types of infusion, and reactive resin transfer processes. Chemo-rheology and flow behaviour models are developed, implemented in different types of models, and further exploited in the processing.
Particular micro-tests set up has been developed furthermore to enable understanding the level of adhesion of the resin to the different types of fibre substrates, through fibre pull-out tests.
Natural polymer extruded cores
The development of bio-based thermoplastic core materials to be exploited in the composites processing has been pursued by VTT. Activities were organised into two main research areas:
- setup of the new tandem line equipment exploiting PP and PS polymers;
- implementation of PLA and other polymers physical foaming in the tandem line.
The tandem extrusion line equipment has been installed in VTT facilities and is operating since March 2012. The modifications and the compound development done by VTT were successful and the extrusion process could be stabilised to produce extruded foams with density between 55 and 170 kg/m3, for PS and PLA, respectively. Besides the polystyrene used in the initial running-in trials, extrusion experiments were conducted with different qualities of polylactic acid, cellulose acetate and polybutylene succinate.
Technological results
Research results applied into practical systems, and constituting the bridge towards the industrialisation represents the practical outcome of the WOODY project. They are listed below and described in details in the following paragraphs, providing as well the final objectives of industrial exploitation:
- yarn processing;
- fire-proof furan resin;
- foamed nanocellulose;
- composite panels;
- water based mould release agent;
- simulation tools;
- composite elements and parts.
Yarn processing
The efforts in the fibre processing are focused on two types of processing:
- formation of continuous natural derived polymer yarns, reinforced by cellulose nanofibres via melt extrusion process;
- functionalising natural fibres based yarns with cellulose nanofibres (surface treatment of cellulosic raw materials).
Fibre processing trials performed by CENTEXBEL by extruding a continuous PLA filament yarn with 0.5 wt% CNW, showed partially good results. Limits to the following exploitation and marketing activities are to be addressed to solve current issues in terms of:
- low tenacity and high strain, probably due to decrease in molecular weight (PLA degradation due to non-optimal residence time under the extrusion conditions);
- degradation triggered by the surface chemistry of CNW (acidic residuals);
- possibly presence of CNW aggregates can further decrease the performances.
Degradation has been detected in the resulting filament, caused by the drying (80 °C) process after the powder mixing. As the pre-compound powder is not yet stabilised, inhibitors suitable to avoid problems in the polymer processing steps have been identified and added during the compounding. The compounding process at 200 °C presented lower water content and limited degradation, proving the effectiveness of actions taken, and good potential for future product optimisation.
Fire-proof furan resin
The improvement in terms of fire resistance of the furan-based composite panels has been achieved as a result of a combined process and formulation development of the resin. Results on fire resistant resin has been achieved on top of the low water content furan formulations developed within the first part of the project. TFC efforts in improving the formulation of the resin for both fire resistance and workability has been performed in close relation and synergy with the composite transformer partners, in order to achieve a product with performances considerably improved in respect to standard synthetic resins, and definitely better than any other natural derived material. Among partners, especially APC has provided the key basis and requirements for the processing development, and APM for the furan products exploiting the fire resistance.
The developed resin was used as matrix material and hot pressed with a natural fibre mat. The results of fire testing on manufactured panels proved successful results, the partner TFC is committed to exploit after the WOODY project to further support the development of products and to address differentiated markets.
Jointly with the manufacturer APC, TFC has developed a resin (code number 050915RF) which is expected to provide the best results. The furan resin 050915RF has been exploited by APM to build a sample containers in order to assess the fire resistance and the process easiness. Composite panels deriving from such resin were extensively exposed to a fire source, proving that after the end of the test the parts maintained almost unaltered the mechanical properties.
Other partners as LIND and VOLVO already planned to exploit it into new classes of parts and semi-finished products, in reason of extremely reduced VOC emissions. The material characteristics have been appreciated by the manufacturers, especially the improvement in terms of workers safety and health with respect to traditional resins, as a reason for the expected future applications.
Foamed nanocellulose
Thanks to the specific actions oriented to the functionalisation of the NCC materials and the joint efforts from HUJ and APC, a structural core for composites that is as well entirely composed of renewable materials has been developed. The discovery of the capability for a nanostructured suspension of NCC in water to self-assemble and to expel the liquid upon freeze-drying condition has been the trigger to develop an aerogel-like structure which is contemporarily lightweight and stiff. The process is completed with the infiltration of the aerogel NCC structure with furan resin, leading to the composite foam that has provided relevant properties in terms of stiffness and light weight.
The activities of research following the basic discovery of the phenomenon has been oriented to the resolution of technological issues finalised to the development of a material that can have product capabilities: customisation of performances, optimisation of the density and verification of performances under real composite core applications.
The exploitation of such result has been put forward thanks to the establishment of a spin-off company from the HUJ, (MELODEA) deputed to the technological development, product implementation, and ultimately the commercial contacts with potential customers and joint developers. In parallel, technical development is forecast to be oriented to the process volumes extension, to upscale pilot plants at the scale of some kg batch and therefore increase the appeal for investments - processing.
Composite panels
The 'composite thinking' approach has been applied in the development of composite elements and parts that can benefit from the performances of the raw materials, and from the reduced needs for further processing. The development of panels (either laminate elements or sandwich ones) is provided with a combination of the different cellulose based textile reinforcements (knitted, woven or roving mats based) and natural traditional cores (balsa wood) or expanded natural derived materials. The panels have been exploited to perform mechanical testing, benchmarking performances against traditional composites, and to support the different functionalities achievable. The aesthetic characterisation is considered as a fundamental added value, to enable direct application into a product development, and to reduce the finishing procedures and costs associated. The composite transformers are already during the course of the project working to exploit such characterisation into new applications. Final results are expected to be applicable from a wide span of potential customers in the automotive or shipbuilding sectors.
Water based mould release agent
The work performed by MARBO focus on the development of the Marbocote WOODY release agent. In particular, activities are focusing on the set-up of the formulation, with specific additives (wetting agents, preservatives...) to ensure applicability, stability against bacteria proliferation in particular conditions and adequate pot life.
The new formulation required an updated evaluation of the stability of the complete formula, completed according to the ISO 20783-1:2011 standard.
Once the formulation was almost completed, a new production procedure was defined to grant the requested performances, and accordingly facilities upgraded. The result enabled to define the correct parameters and the improvement of the working parameters (temperature, pressure, stirring, separation steps, timing and sufficient batch volumes...).
Mould release testing was performed on various substrate (moulds) and in contact with different resins. The results proved to be positive with the different resins and substrates, with a particular positive effect on standard mould materials (composite and metal moulds), not suitable on water sensitive moulds (wood and MDF ones).
On the basis of such positive results, the activity of MARBO after the project is already oriented to get to a final product to industrial customers and to ensure applicability into several industrial fields. As a first market, MARBO is addressing sectors in which environmental, worker's health (and costs) concerns for the solvent-based solutions are higher, for example the wind energy sector.
Simulation tools
Modelling software, based on classical composites theory, has been designed and programmed to be as transversal as possible across the different composite materials applications, in order to be further expandable after the project completion, and updatable on the basis of the different and new materials. The tool provides a platform covering all the aspects of the composite material development, from the raw materials to the final structural analysis, enabling comparison of different solutions and information on the processing and the materials.
Eight modules are available for the tool, as resulting from the WOODY development. They cover the knowledge repository module, the conceptual and the composite design modules. Materials LCA data, carbon footprint and cost aspects, as well as a decision support system providing methods for selection of the appropriate materials as a function of the expected functionalities are embedded in the decision support. The platform is expected to be exploited at first through composite associations' websites or group of interests, being a good and practical alternative tool for composite designers and engineers, compared to more expensive and robust, but complex solutions available in the market.
The material database exploits both commercial data and the data of the lab tests got from the research partners, covering fibres, resins, cores, additives and integrated composites.
Composite elements and parts
A wide span of products, or parts in composite materials deriving from the WOODY materials and design indications have been developed: skis, showcase for permanent exhibition, tanks and prefabricated modules, as well as parts for the transportation field, as well as pre-pregs to be shaped in compression moulding. In particular, in the following the results of the wind blades for transportation sector are described, as a showcase with a potential follow-up and upscaling.
Composite wind blades reinforced with different textiles have been tested and characterised mechanically in order to evaluate the performance of different technological solutions. In particular the three reinforcing textiles assessed are:
- carbon fibre;
- flax fibre;
- mix of carbon and flax.
The three materials have been assessed with different textures in order to evaluate the most performing solution for the blade manufacturing. For all the sample, the resin material was chosen to be the SuperSap 100/1000 produced by Entropy Resins (United States (US)), which is 48 % bio-based, as the furan resin at the stage of development was not suitable for the specific features of vacuum bagging moulding. The final application of the wind blade is a particular prototype of wind propelled vehicle that represented DTU to a contest of zero emission prototypes.
Layup of the fibres and the textile layers has been optimised through modelling systems. The materials (small samples and full parts) have been tested and fully characterised to achieve a clear view on the impact of the materials selection on the final performances.
The final selection is a mix of flax and carbon fibres, providing optimal trade-off between the weight and the mechanical performances, and contributing significantly to reduce the final cost of the blade.
Potential impact, main dissemination activities and exploitation of results
Project potential impact
The research and development activities, and associated achievements in terms of industrial technologies, materials and industrialisation, represent a proof of the results achievable thanks to European level cooperation involving the key stakeholders. Already established contacts with intelligent manufacturing systems (IMS) organisation put the basis for international cooperation at worldwide level and extended the impact potentiality of the project.
This approach permitted to address the challenges foreseen within WOODY project and to translate the results directly into procedures applicable by end users and composites processor partners.
The European dimension of the project supported its final objective to develop and promote entirely natural resources based materials, suitable for a wide portfolio of applications. In many cases, the project results have been of a suitable quality to be directly addressing the market.
EuCIA/EuPC partner is in direct contact with about 51 European plastics converting national and European industry associations, representing close to 50 000 companies, producing over 45 million tons of plastic products every year. More than 1.6 million people are working in those companies to create a turnover in excess of EUR 280 billion per year. It is supposed that a share of 10 % (about 5000 companies) can potentially be interested in the WOODY outputs. Though, due to the non-direct link between EuPC and the companies, and in order to provide a limited scenario, it is expected that a small number of companies will enter into direct contact with the WOODY results. Taking into account a pessimistic hypothesis that only the 1 % of the European composite industry companies are interested to adopt WOODY based technology, still a huge number of companies (500) would still be reached, generating turnover and further multiplying the products outreach. Such numbers of possible clients are expected to generate an increasing turnover for both the industry and the knowledge centers involved in the project.
WOODY results are expected to address a number of European Commission directives:
- Promoting employment, by identifying new business opportunities for the partners widening and differentiating their product offering. No discrimination on genders is expected, thanks to the intrinsic variety of the intended services and products;
- Qualifying jobs: moving the business of partners towards new opportunities of higher added value and pursuing highly qualified jobs;
- Promoting a healthier working environment: by introducing water based, volatile organic compound (VOC) free products, by introducing natural-based materials and by creating a new range of products made from scraps, thus favouring a sustainable industrial production and promoting a conscious exploitation of resources.
Main dissemination activities
Having a strong connection to the European composite research and industrial network, WOODY partners, participated to a wide range of events. Public articles, presentation at TAPPI, JEC, Composites Europe and other fairs, the demonstration elements installed in Stockholm Museum and other public locations, contacts with international stakeholders, contributed to generate awareness against the wide public and interested entities. In the following some of the main events are briefly outlined.
Brindisi workshop: A final public workshop was organised by the WOODY partners in the facilities of CETMA to disseminate the achievements and spread the use of bio-based materials in the composite industry. The event included short presentations of project results and lab-working sessions. Especially company active in wind blade manufacturing showed great interest to the event. Ten external companies, highly interested in the processing and transformation of composite materials participated to the event.
Euronews equipe participated to the workshop. The event was used to create a video on the WOODY project. Several interviews and shoots were realised creating a story to show the project development and the results obtained. (Video attached to the final reporting and available at http://www.euronews.com/2013/01/28/cooking-up-natural-plastics/ online).
Industrial Technologies 2012: by participating to Industrial Technologies 2012, WOODY met over 160 high profile international speakers from industry, government and research, discussing visions for European research and industry towards 2020. WOODY project was selected to be in the shortlist of 10 projects competing for the final award and was presented by Andrea Ferrari to the whole assembly.
BiPoCo 2012: Together with other two concurrent projects involved in the development of materials from natural resources (BIO-STRUCT and FORBIOPLAST), WOODY has been partner in the organisation of the 2012 Conference on Bio-Based Polymers and Composites (Bi.Po.Co) held in Siofok (Hungary). The event (see http://www.bipoco2012.hu for details) collected the interest of a wide panel of researchers, experts and industries, involved in the plastic and composite field that are looking with high commitment to the bio-based alternative.
International Conference on Polymer and Textile Biotechnology: WOODY project was presented at the Seventh International Conference on Polymer and Textile Biotechnology organised in Milan. Andrea Ferrari (DAPP) was invited to give a speech about bio-based materials and their exploitation into composites.
COMPOTEC: WOODY presented at CETMA booth in COMPOTEC fair. Compotec is the first exhibition in Italy entirely dedicated to research, production, making up and technologies of composite materials. It's a new and unique event in the Italian trade fair panorama: its target is to bring together universities, research institutes, industries, organisations and media in a three days event in order to present the composite technologies, processes and developments. The exhibition, at its fourth edition, has registered the presence of 125 exhibitors covering a surface of 5000 sqmt.
Exploitable results
The WOODY project is aiming to creating a range of opportunities, at different levels, from knowledge and materials to end-user applications. All of them have exploitation potential, and have been listed and described within the PUEK document. They are outlined below:
- Materials: The project will generate valuable performance information from the materials tested and used in the project. Additionally, new composite materials could be developed, of applicability for a wider range of structural materials, and exploitable beyond the scope of the project. Research institutions can transfer the knowledge generated in the project to their own industrial areas of influence, promoting a wider use of wood based composites in the construction and other industries.
- Formulations: The formulations developed in the project can facilitate the licensing to third parties, and contribute to create a supply chain, as well as to generate demand.
- Prototypal elements, in particular for the construction and transportation industry: these are the most immediate end user sectors of application and several available concepts and prototypes constitute already a good base for exploitation, but the areas of application are already widening to furniture, pre-fabricated modules, etc.;
- Software: The design tool and the knowledge repository can help engineers to identify the materials, and to find new applications for the future, exploiting a wide classification and multivariable-based decisional approaches.
A list of all the exploitable outcomes of the project is provided in the following, as extracted from the 'Plan for use and exploitation of knowledge' (PUEK) document in its definitive version, D10.35 issued 31 December 2012. They have been grouped according to exploitation cluster and analyzed in detail.
- Eco-compatible NFC materials, according to improvement and refinement of traditional methods
- NCC materials extracted from paper industry wastes with enzyme treatment based on CBD
- Industrial upscaled resin extraction technologies
- Tailor made furan resin formulations for the specific applications
- Nano-cellulose modified biopolymer formulations
- Surface functionalisation of textiles using CBD and nano-cellulose formulations
- Modified textile processing, enabling to cost-effectively transform the fibres into yarns, webs, woven or knitted textiles
- Innovative core materials starting from natural based polymers, either derived from PLA or starch
- Core development process technology
- Matrix material based on furfural polymer
- Nanobased natural components for functionalising the wood based materials (anti-flame, foaming, adhesion promoting, ultraviolet (UV) blocking etc.)
- Injection mouldable technopolymers - nanocellulose composites
- Prototypes / pre-industrial laminate
- Prototypes / pre-industrial sandwich panel
- Ready-to-market natural based composites exploiting WOODY results
- Textile structures for green walls application
- Project knowledge base
- Design tool: Software based design support, structural module and decisional support modules
- Product life cycle analysis
- Training materials and activities
- Architectural composite structures for interiors and exteriors
- Semi-permanent release agents.
Project website: http://www.woodyproject.eu