DESIGNING SUSTAINABLE PRODUCTS USING ANNUALLY RENEWABLE RESOURCES AND NANOCOMPOSITE TECHNOLOGY

Environmental materials-related factors have become important parts of product design activity since the environmental effects of products can be best controlled in the design stage. Efforts for sustainable product design process have gained importance recently, due to increasing environmental pollution and global warming. Therefore materials application in products has become critical.

Synthetic plastics have become an important group of materials for product designers as they are versatile and easily processed. But from a sustainability point of view, newly emerging bio-based polymers have certain advantages over oil-based polymers. Resources for bio-based materials are annually renewable and the materials do not add to carbon dioxide release into the earth’s atmosphere during product life cycles. Availability and cost of biopolymers are less dependent on the uncertain development of the oil price. Another factor promoting biopolymers is the availability of a wide range of property profiles, similar to oil-based polymers. Most biopolymers are biodegradable, usually under composting conditions, whereas they do not degrade under intended service conditions.

Nano-structured materials, particularly nanocomposites, are relatively new for oil-based polymers, and even more so for biopolymers. Inherent advantages of polymer nanocomposites include high effectiveness at low additive concentrations in increasing properties such as stiffness and practical service temperatures, and greatly improved recyclability as compared with fiber-filled polymers. The combination of increased stiffness and biodegradability in bio-based nanocomposites would hence combine reduction of material consumption, cost, and waste.

A project was initiated to address both practical nanocomposite behavior in products and requirements for design support in dealing with novel materials and technologies, particularly bio-based and nano-strucured materials. Developing such a design support environment is considered necessary because a new material or technology generally needs conversion into a design opportunity before it can be applied. Additionally, new and surprising opportunities may be very inspiring in early design stages.

Experimental work to explore the opportunities of bio-based nanocomposites included investigating injection molding processability and product properties, for which several nanocompounds with poly(lactic acid) were prepared. From group discussions with miscellaneous professionals, as well as literature, it was concluded that a design support environment requires non-expert language for communication with designers and applicators, without loosing useful technical information. Several interviewed scientific researchers were enthusiastic about establishing communication with designers and applicators to facilitate near-future application of their research results. These results are encouraging for initiating development of a design support environment.