Functional biomaterials as a sustainable alternative to consumer products in the Valencian Community: toy, packaging, and household sectors – BioFcase

 

 

 

Human carbon emissions from burning fossil fuels have increased by between 33% & 130% over the last decades compared to the past 800,000 years. Even if European standards require manufacturers to implement sustainable alternatives, it can be hard for them to find substitute feedstock, especially when dealing with polymeric materials. It is not feasible for consumer goods manufacturers -either technically or economically- to replace entirely their feedstock and meet these new sustainability requirements on their products by adapting the related processes.

 

Manufacturers demand, consequently, sustainable materials ready for implementation within their range of products while fully adapted to technical requirements of the latter. Could we help them adopt sustainable materials, while keeping most of their products’ technical specifications the same, and offer free advice to help them with this transition? A free consultancy service has been launched to assist companies transitioning to these new legislative requirements in the fastest and most cost-efficient manner. We started by meeting with more than 11 companies involved in the production of consumer goods, so as to make sure that we had fully understood their constraints, and explore what materials and additives could be replaced in their current production chain.

 

Then, tests on these alternative materials were conducted to ensure their fitting these companies’ requirements of durability and safety, while becoming more environmentally sustainable. Subsequently, we scaled up the production of the best performing materials to work with the testing companies on how to implement these both in their supply chain and production process, so that they could have a turnkey solution to produce increasingly sustainable goods for consumers. Since the roll out of our consultancy support, we have partnered with seven companies involved in fields ranging from the production of fuel-based consumer products to the production of functional bio-based ones.

 

And five more companies have shown their interest in receiving our support. These companies account for the production of more than 860.000 items per year altogether. We are BioFcase – and we support SMEs to adapt their feedstock to new regulations, with the result these companies may rest assured that they shall transition rapidly without disrupting their whole production chain. This project is piloted by AIJU – the leading technological institute for children’s products and leisure in Spain.

 

  • Agreement number :CONV21/DGINN/18
  • Starting day : 01-01-2021
  • Duration : 12 months
  • Status : In progress
  • Amount requested : 299.783,33€

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