Objective
"Fiber-reinforced composites have been in use, in particular for aeronautical applications, for the past 40 years, mostly thanks to their high specific mechanical properties providing high strength and stiffness. Nevertheless, in light of the growing environmental awareness, classic fibers, such as carbon fibers or glass fibers, suffer several drawbacks among which the fact that they are based on non renewable resources, the high amounts of energy required to produce them and their recycling at the end of their lifetime which is problematic.
Thus, over the last decade, natural fibers have received increasing interest as a potential replacement for classic synthetic fibers, especially for polymer matrix composites, thanks to their bio-based character, good specific mechanical properties and renewable supply.
Bamboo fibers i.e. cellulose fibers extracted from the pulp of bamboo plants have excellent natural mechanical properties. With an average density of bamboo fiber of 0,9, bamboo specific mechanical properties even exceed those of glass fibers.
Bamboo fibers offer new perspectives for producing ‘greener composites’ in the sense that they constitute a renewable resource and the processing of the fibers is environmentally friendly. However, existing bamboo fibers tend to be short and randomly oriented, which means the resulting composite mechanical properties are relatively low. It is well-known that fibers provide the highest strength and stiffness when they are continuous and aligned in the direction of applied load. There is currently no process capable of spinning bamboo fibers into continuous strands. Further developments are therefore needed.
In the BIFTTEC project, BAMBOO FIBERS TECHNOLOGY, a French SME which has developed a novel industrial extraction process to extract high quality bamboo fibers proposes to develop a low energy process for converting these bamboo fibers into woven fabrics for use in aeronautical composites applications."
Fields of science
- engineering and technologyenvironmental engineeringwaste managementwaste treatment processesrecycling
- engineering and technologymaterials engineeringfibers
- natural scienceschemical sciencespolymer sciences
- engineering and technologymaterials engineeringtextiles
- engineering and technologymaterials engineeringcompositescarbon fibers
Call for proposal
SP1-JTI-CS-2011-02
See other projects for this call
Funding Scheme
JTI-CS - Joint Technology Initiatives - Clean SkyCoordinator
64270 LAHONTAN
France