Bio-based Materials

A bio-sourced composite material for window frames

Winner: Innobat (France)
Partners: Amroy Europe Oy (Finland), Safilin SA (France) and Top Glass _ Kemrock Group (France and Italy and India)

 

 

The bio-based material (bio-based epoxy resin reinforced with flax fibre) combines very good thermal and mechanical properties  while offering the required properties for window frames. Based on these criteria, it can compete with traditional raw materials such as PVC and aluminum. This composite has a particularly low environmental footprint due to the use of bio-based components.

The bio-composite was developed for the production of window frames. The European market amounts to about 70 million windows, 700,000 metric tons of composites and €7 billion a year. The objective is to capture 3% of this market over 5 years.

PVC offers very good thermal insulation but a low modulus of elasticity, requiring PVC window profiles to be reinforced with steel components. Aluminum has a very good modulus of elasticity but very poor thermal insulation properties, which means that aluminum
window profiles need to integrate polyamide strips to ensure a thermal break.Both PVC and aluminum have a poor environmental footprint, mainly due to their
production process.



Other finalists in the Bio-based Materials category
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· A bio-based, rigid structural foam presented by Bioresin (Brazil) with its partner University of Southampton (UK).

· Moulded brick for modular passive house walls made of bio-Based materials presented by Biotopes Architecture & Design (France) with its partners Groupe Depestele - Teillage Vandecandelaere (France) and Université du Havre (LOMC) (France).

· iPad cover made of bio-sourced materials presented by FiberShell (France) with its partners Novation Spa (Italy), RocTool (France) and Schappe Techniques (France).

· The first-ever open-sea racing boat integrating up to 50% renewable fibres (flax), presented by Renards des Mers (France) with its partners Huntsman Advanced Materials GmbH (Switzerland), Cipalin (France), Lineo&Libeco Lagae (Belgium), IDB Marine (France) and IFTH (France).