A new biocomposite material at your fingertips

The green waste of some will be the raw material of others
The Compolive project, supported by the European Life fund, has taken a new step in the development of a new biocomposite material, based on recycled plastic and waste related to the cultivation of olive trees, mainly concentrated in Andalusia.

Andaltec, the research center
The thermoplastic materials research center, based in the heart of Andalusia, Andaltec spent nearly a year selecting fibers made up largely of green waste and pruning residue from olive trees. He had to analyze many criteria to determine the composition, the size of the most relevant fibers, their optimal adhesion to the plastic material which will serve as the base…. It is a question of inventing a carbon-free material that will best correspond to the applications envisaged: namely in the fields of the automobile, furniture and urban outdoor furniture.

The Andaltec research center has selected the fineness of grinding of the fibers and the recycled plastic material in order to carry out the various possible combinations of incorporation. It is a question of evaluating the percentage of optimal load in order to determine the biobased plastic most likely to be put on the compounding market and to enter into the composition of functional parts that will be found in the automobile, furnishings and street furniture.

Samples pass stress tests
8 samples passed the tests successfully: tensile, elongation and bending tests, stress at break, shore hardness test and charpy impact test. The Compolive material from olive fibers has been incorporated into a recycled polypropylene between 25 and 35%.

These 8 biocomposites will now be tested in the prototyping phase to analyze their melting and injection behavior and ultimately observe the technical and aesthetic qualities of the finished products. It will still take some time to coordinate the results between the different European countries and aggregate the results.

Be part of the great circular economy adventure
The Plasturgia Group is very proud to be mobilized within this European program and to be associated with the creation of a new biocomposite material, resulting from the implementation of a large-scale circular economy: Spain – France – Germany. In a few years, this material will surely be one of the alternatives to petro-sourced plastic and the Plasturgia group will have been one of the pioneers who took part in the great adventure.