#composites, #sustainability, #carbonfootprint, #renewableenergy, #fibers, #resins Last week I wrote about the raw materials for composites and how high their carbon footprint is, primarily because at present most if not all raw materials for advanced composites are based in petroleum – big oil.  This week I want to follow the roadmap outlined in my new book to the next step.  That step is the production process for the fibers and resins that make up modern composites, that i

#composites, #sustainability, #rawmaterials, #greenmaterials, #naturalfibers, #naturalresins I’m going back to what I wrote about a couple of weeks ago – the recommendations for the composites industry that I have in my upcoming book.  I promised that I would deal with each part of the industry in turn until I got all the way to the recyclers, talking about where we are today and what I see as a path to sustainability that each piece of the industry can take. From https://act

#composites, #sustainability, #naturalfibers, #autoindustry, #circularity This week I thought I would highlight one of the things I touched on in my second book and also expand a bit on a theme I brought up a few months ago.  The idea is that there is a growing trend in the auto industry to make their products more environmentally friendly as well as easier to recycle when the auto is used up.  This theme is a recurring one in many industries, but since the auto industry uses

#composites, #sustainability, #agwaste, #forestproductswaste, #woodwaste, #DARPA I know I promised to talk about my upcoming book in this and the next few posts, but I saw such an interesting article on LinkedIn on March 2 (last Monday) from DARPA of all places that I had to write about it.  I’ll weave the book back in a bit later in this post after I describe what I saw from DARPA. Fleetwood Project – DARPA Biological Technologies Office March 2, 2026 The article is about an

#composites, #sustainability, #vitrimer, #recyclableresin, #biocomposite, #bioresins I have been seeing articles in several different things that I read about a new class of polymers that is rather intriguing.  These polymers are called “vitrimers”.  Polymers that were processable by covalent bond exchange reactions (movable and reconfigurable covalent crosslinks) were developed initially in the 1990’s at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (UIUC).  James Economy’s gr

#composites, #sustainability, #flaxfiber, #biocomposites, #fibers There appears to be quite a bit of movement in the natural, plant-based fiber business this past week or two.  Two announcements came out in Composites World about companies that are scaling up their flax fiber composite reinforcements business, and another one that I will talk about a bit later about a basalt fiber production facility being built in the Middle East.  New Circular Structures USA Inc. Facility i

#composites, #sustainability, #energyefficiency, #renewableenergy, #fibers, #resins Yes, in fact, a company in Houston called Mars Materials, Inc. which is a public benefit corporation incorporated in Texas, teamed up with the Textile Innovation Engine of North Carolina and NC State University to take CO 2  captured from the atmosphere and ammonia/bio-based feedstocks and turn it into acrylonitrile.  The Textile Innovation Center at NC State tested the Mars material and found

#composites, #textiles, #naturalfibers, #bioresins, #historyofcomposites I read a really good book this last week about the history of textiles.  The title of the book is “The Fabric of Civilization, How Textiles Made the World” by Virginia Postrel.  This book is a number one bestseller that my wife bought for all of us in the family to read.  It was recommended by John and Hank Green, the Vlog Brothers who also are the creators of the Crash Course series of educational YouTu

#racingsailboats, #sustainability, #naturalfiber, #flaxfiber, #bamboofiber, #bioresins I saw an article in Composites World this week about a flax fiber boat manufacturer I wrote about two and a half years ago – Greenboats – that has been building recreational sailboat hulls since about 2020 using flax fiber.  They source their flax of course from France which grows more of this stuff than any other country in Europe.  Anyway, the article is about a strategic partnership betw

#composites, #sustainability, #energyefficiency, #renewableenergy, #fibers, #resins Since this is supposed to be a “newsletter” I thought I would collect some tidbits of news on the composites sustainability front that have come across my feed in the last couple of weeks.  I did want to get a couple of state of the art posts done, so the last two weeks I haven’t been keeping everyone up with the latest news.  And there has been some news to keep up with, especially in the rec

#composites, #sustainability, #plantbased, #biocomposites, #fibers, #resins Article reposted from www.nedpatton.com I saw a brief snippet...

#composites, #sustainability, #biocmoposites, #lactate, #plantfibers, #bioresins A really interesting article popped up in a feed that I...

#composites, #sustainability, #plantbased, #mushroomfiber, #pineapplefiber, #bananafiber, #seaweed My wife sent me a SciShow link this...

#composites, #sustainability, #biocomposites, #plantbased, #fibers, #resins You heard me right, both of the major transport aircraft...

#composites, #sustainability, #carbonfiber, #cellulose, #lignin, #plantbased Last week I focused on the up and coming composite resins...

#composites, #sustainability, #plantbased, #rbioresin, #resins One of the things that I wrote about in the book that I have coming out is...

#composites, #sustainability, #cellulose, #plastic, #biodegradable, #microplastics, #ocean I came across a really interesting article in...

#composites, #sustainability, #energyefficiency, #renewableenergy, #fibermanufacture, #resinmanufacture This week I thought I would touch...

#composites, #sustainability, #thermoplastics, #recycledfibers, #recycledresin I saw an article in Composites World this week that I...

#composites, #sustainability, #biocomposite, #naturalfibers, #plantbasedresins, #plantbased I have written about biocomposites, plant...