Project description
Innovative MDF waste treatment
Renewable energy targets and bioproducts have increased the demand for wood and wood-based products. Many of these have become commodity products with ‘short’ lifespans. However, the lack of appropriate techno-economic solutions prevents their reuse or recycling. One of these commodity products, which generates high volumes of landfilled material, is medium-density fibreboard (MDF). The EU-funded FibreCarb project presents an innovative MDF waste treatment process targeting the wood based activated carbon market, a high-value market. The self-sustainable technology consists in upcycling the MDF waste and turning it into high quality activated carbon and renewable energy as a secondary product.
Objective
Mankind uses wood as a raw material since the stone age. It has been perceived to be an abundantly available even renewable resource, it literally grows everywhere and people have a natural tendency to apply wood for their everyday use in many ways Nevertheless, Recently, demand for wood and wood-based products are significant increasing, not only for reaching the renewable energy target but also for bio-products for biorefineries. Unfortunately, many of these products have become nowadays commodity products with “short” lifespans. They still have not found their way to be fully reused or recycled, lacking appropriate techno–economic solutions. One of these commodity products - being produced at 11.000.000 ton/year and resulting in 10.000.000 m³ of landfilled material – is fibreboard (MDF board), one of the wood-board types used in many cheaper type of furniture. Act&Sorb developed a technology that addresses the societal challenge by having identified a high value large market– the wood based activated carbon market – currently using also fresh wood! Act&Sorb has been able – aligned with its overall vision and strategy – to design the MDF waste treatment process in such a way that the component within the MDF waste causing it to be difficult to be recycled – the glue – is turned into a valued resource – enabling the production of nitrogen incorporated wood-board waste activated carbon, a specialty product with high market value. The concept has the potential to treat the full amount of fiberboard waste while eliminating the need for fresh wood for the production of wood based activated carbon.
Fields of science
- engineering and technologyenvironmental engineeringwaste managementwaste treatment processesrecycling
- engineering and technologyenvironmental engineeringenergy and fuelsrenewable energy
- engineering and technologychemical engineeringseparation technologiesdesalinationreverse osmosis
- engineering and technologyindustrial biotechnologybiomaterials
- agricultural sciencesagriculture, forestry, and fisheriesforestry
Programme(s)
Funding Scheme
SME-1 - SME instrument phase 1Coordinator
3530 HOUTHALEN-HELCHTEREN
Belgium
The organization defined itself as SME (small and medium-sized enterprise) at the time the Grant Agreement was signed.