The textile industry is challenged today to make a radical shift towards the increased use of renewable and recyclable materials. The European Commission declared bio-based products as a lead market in 2007. By 2020, 10 million tons of fibres should be coming from renewable resources. A substantial increase in cultivation and application of bast fibres, such as flax and nettle, as well as a breakthrough in the use of biopolymers is required.
Hence, a number of research projects have been carried out at ITA in the past few years to develop production and processing technologies for natural fibres (NF) and biopolymers. The studies deal with establishing processing methodologies through the entire textile processing chain for NF and biopolymers for developing products for applications in technical textiles.
The projects entail co-operation with institutes and industry partners from Germany and other European countries. The partners range from NF suppliers, biopolymer and filament manufacturers, chemists and additive suppliers, nonwoven producers, staple fibre processing and spinning companies, woven and knitted fabric manufacturers, composite manufacturers to end-users, such as OEMs, automotive and furniture industry, FRCPs and manufacturers of toys, suitcases and sports articles.
As a result, a range of technologies for processing biopolymers have been developed. These include nonwoven, staple spinning, weaving, knitting and compression molding technologies for biopolymer fibres and bio-composites of NF and biopolymers. Furthermore, products with at least similar performance compared to their market competitor have been developed.
Take for example, PLA woven fabrics exhibited 30% higher tensile modulus and 20% higher tearing strength as compared to polyester fabrics used for car seat covers. NF-PLA exhibited 70% higher tensile modulus and thrice the bending modulus as NF-PP composites used in car door panels. Some examples of the products are PLA fabrics for car seat covers, NF-PLA composites for car seat and door panels, bio-composite cell phone covers, self-reinforced PLA composite for applications in suitcases and other FRCPs.
This article comes from intnews edit released