The overall objective of the RECREATE project is to develop a set of innovative technologies aimed at exploiting the circularity potential of End-of-Life (EoL) complex composite waste (mainly carbon fiber reinforced composites CFRC, and glass fiber reinforced composites GFRC) as a feedstock for profitable reuse of parts and materials in the manufacturing industry.
The demand for both composites and high-performance fiber materials (especially carbon) at affordable costs is foreseen to grow steadily in the next few years. This trend is driven by progressive banning of landfilling of composite waste and growing needs in many sectors like automotive, transportation, wind energy, and in general for the lightweight design field. It is therefore crucial that new technological alternatives to the more consolidated mechanical grinding and pyrolysis are identified, so as to allow the recovery and reuse of materials and components in an environmental and economically convincing and sustainable way.
In the light of these considerations, the ambition of the RECREATE project is:
- to develop and validate in relevant environment novel reuse strategies for current generation, large EoL composite parts (including complex multi-material composites) based on smart recognition and inspection for sorting, high-precision dismantling and repair, temperature-assisted reshaping, design for disassembly based on reversible joints, artificial-intelligence-assisted decision support systems;
- to develop and validate in relevant environment innovative physico-chemical upcycling technologies allowing simultaneous recovery of high quality, integer, clean fibres and of an organic resin fraction reusable as secondary raw material, at the very end of the multiple reuse processes of parts.
- to demonstrate the use of smart and green reversible thermoset resins as enabling materials for the realization of the next generation of fiber-reinforced composites with easier repairability and enhanced reusability, facilitating the transition towards recyclable-by-design composite materials and structures.
Moreover, another key objective of the RECREATE project is to develop a set of new digital tools for:
- the quantitative evaluation of the environmental and socio-economic performance of the proposed technologies as well as their circularity assessment and acceleration;
- the co-design of innovative digital learning resources in the field of composite circularity, with easy adoption and high replicability.
