Development of new Competitive and Sustainable Bio-Based Plastics
The objective of NEWPACK is to validate in industrial setting the production of at least two new bio-plastics based on PHB/PLA blends with improved sustainability performance, obtained by the addition of natural extracts with antioxidant/antibacterial properties and nano additives from cellulose and chitin.
A new circular economy value chain will be generated from agro-food wastes that will be exploited for the production of PHB, while designing and validating the process up to pilot scale.
- Blending of PLA and PHB will be validated at pilot scale to achieve specific final product requirements based on targeted products.
- New bioplastic properties and functionalities will be achieved through incorporation of nano-cellulose or nano-chitin additives (to improve typical problems of processability and mechanical properties of PLA-PHB), antioxidant and antimicrobial additives. The ability to extend the functionalities will be validated in real industrial environments.
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NEWPACK activities are underpinned by the prior experience and results (already validated at TRL 3-4) of the partners in order to achieve advanced TRLs (5-6) for the developed technologies, including:
- PHB production from potato peels/sweet corn residues;
- Co-blending of PHB with PLA;
- Nano-cellulose extraction from wheat straw and incorporation into PHB-PLA blends
- And encapsulation of natural antioxidants/antimicrobials for addition to PHB-PLA.
Great emphasis will be on:
- Assessing the technical and economic feasibility of the processes;
- Demonstrating the biodegradability of solutions;
- Ensuring the compliance to the market and regulatory requirements;
- LCA evaluation;
- Preparing for future scale-up of the processes to achieve a preindustrial production and identification of stakeholders perceptions, attitudes and expectations towards bioplastics.
ACTIVITIES of the Bio Base Europe Pilot Plant
Optimization and demonstration of:
- Production of fermentable sugars from agro-food industry co-products potato peels and sweet corn residues
- Production of biopolymer PHB from above sugars using more sustainable “green” downstream purification process
- Pilot scale production of nano-additives from chitin and wheat straw
PARTNERS
- University of Oulo, FI
- Universita Cattolica del Sacre Cuore, IT
- CTIC – CITA, ES
- Bio Base Europe Pilot Plant, BE
- TECNALIA, ES
- Proplast, IT
- TecnoPackaging, ES
- Lulea University of Technology, SE
- Quantis, CH
- TRI TECC, RO
- Groupo riberebro, ES
- Argal, ES
SUPPORTED by:
This project is funded by the Bio-Based Industries Joint Undertaking under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No. 792261.
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