News & Insights

How Expanding Wood Utilization Impacts the Circular Economy

The 2019 Wood Solutions Conference in Vancouver featured a presentation by the Norwegian company Voll Arkitekter about the design and construction of Mjøstårnet, the world's tallest timber building with 18 storeys, completed in March 2019. This building exemplifies the considerable efforts across the world, including British Columbia, to push the limit on utilizing wood in the construction industry. As these initiatives continue to grow and attain establishment, the question about their relevance to our goal of building a circular economy becomes of more importance. While the cascading use of wood, a framework to promote non-fuel applications of wood whenever possible, has a long history, circular economy is bringing new requirements into our perspective for managing wood products.

A renewable resource
Wood is a natural material, abundantly available and easy to produce, thus becoming an excellent material for the circular economy. When it comes to the construction industry, the intensive production energy of some building materials also favors wood as a more sustainable low-energy alternative. In addition, the capacity of wood to capture and store CO₂ from the atmosphere helps to mitigate climate change. Despite these benefits, the complications with respect to circular economy and 5R strategy arise when the technological approaches adopted for expanding wood applications are taken into account, as some might hinder circularity and prevent sustainable end-of-life solutions.

Improving durability and strength: are the solutions circular?
Extending the lifespan of wood products, which is also desired by the circular economy principles, entails improving wood resistance against mold and insects, as well as increasing its durability against moisture and sunlight. These requirements have led to the development of many treatment methods that integrate chemicals into wood to enhance its properties. These modifications of wood can impose restrictions on possible pathways for circularity and second life.

Moreover, increasing the load-bearing capacity of wood has led to the development of engineered wood materials, which can potentially complicate the environmental performance of wood in the economy. For example, the fabrication of cross-laminated timber, a key structural material in Mjøstårnet, requires using glues to bond layers of wood lamellae. This multi-material structure can bring about new challenges for recycle and repair which is not present when dealing with unmodified wood.

To ensure long-term sustainability, these innovation efforts need to be accompanied with circular and life cycle thinking at the early stages of product and process development. This will ensure that health and disposal aspects of the chemicals used in the treatment are well understood and the problematic substances are eliminated. In addition, by allowing the design for circularity to guide the development process, the possibilities of next lives for the product and its constituents would be well taken into account.

On the path towards improved circularity, material and manufacturing innovations can play important roles, as well. Bio-based coatings, glues and additives that can be safely disposed to the biological cycle during the recycling process are examples of these innovations. In addition, new technologies are under development that create bonding between wood pieces through mechanical processes, thus eliminating chemicals in the structure. Laboratory testing and R&D services can validate the safety and biodegradability of these bio-based alternatives before market introduction.

Design innovations can also facilitate material recovery, repair, and remanufacture for wood products. As an example, the timber construction of the Cradle building in Düsseldorf, Germany, to be completed in 2022, has been designed for easy dismantling of the building façade. Needless to say, these design modifications must be complemented with changes in demolition practices to facilitate the recovery of material.

The efforts to promote circularity and 5R with respect to wood is not limited to the construction sector. The European Union's Waste Framework Directive requires that 25 percent of wood packaging (e.g., wooden pallets) be recycled in 2025. This can also encourage the repair of these products. The furniture industry is also witnessing the emergence of new circular business models, e.g., Desko in Europe, aiming to promote the remanufacture and refurbishment of office furniture, including the ones made of wood.

Getting the most out of the by-products
The desire in expanding the use of wood as a material resource will also result in an increase in the amount of by-products generated during wood processing operations. Examples of these by-products are bark, the outermost layers of stems, and sawdust whose fate need to be accounted for in a holistic circular framework for wood products. So far, these materials have been mostly burnt into energy; however, more policies and regulations are expected to emerge that encourage other application paths for them.

For example, the antimicrobial and antioxidative compounds found in the wood bark can found applications in pharmaceutical, cosmetic and food industries. Additionally, the high concentration of lignin, the binding agent of wood fibers, in bark can feed the research and commercialization efforts on developing value-added products from lignin, such as carbon fibers and 3d-printing filaments.

Forests: climate change mitigation vs wood production
While the expectations from forests to provide material resources for our future economy is high, they are also playing an important role in capturing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and thus alleviating climate change. In this regard, proper sourcing of wood becomes critical, and guidance from organizations like PEFC and FSC on sustainably managed forests can help designers and developers make informed decisions regarding their material sourcing. This will ensure a sustainable supply of wood as a renewable material for the emerging circular economy without compromising the benefits trees and forests are offering to our environment.

by 5REDO

Going Beyond Re-Melting to Meet Plastic Recycling Goals

During the 2018 G7 summit in Quebec, the Canadian Government championed the Ocean Plastic Charter, which articulates a number of goals to alleviate the environmental impact of plastic use. Among those include a minimum of 50% recycled content in plastic products, where applicable, by 2030 and the recovery of 100% of all plastics by 2040. Indeed, the Charter is not the only place where such commitments regarding plastic recycling can be found. The European Commission has also set a binding recycling target of 55% by 2030 for plastic packaging waste, which compared to 2014, corresponds to more than twice the amount of the total recycled material.

With all these targets in the horizon for the next 10 to 20 years, the question arises here is whether the current recycling technologies can give us all we need to meet our ambitions for managing the end-of-life plastic products. Of course, the recycling technology is one part of the solution, and other enabling factors, such as design for recyclability and collection systems, are essential as well. However, considering the limitation of the commonly-used recycling processes, it is deemed inevitable to establish new scalable technologies that can considerably increase the rate of plastic recycling.

Currently, the most common method for recycling plastic waste is through mechanical processes, which typically includes sorting, washing and grinding. The resulting ground recycled plastic can then be thermoformed into new plastic products. While being simple and easy to scale up, mechanical recycling only allows the reprocessing of the same material for a limited number of times. Since additives and contaminants are not removed and tend to accumulate, the physical and mechanical properties of the material degrades with each reprocessing cycle. Also, depending on the requirements of the final product, the recycled material cannot get the chance of being reused due to health and safety concerns.

Such drawbacks have encouraged the development of another path for processing plastic waste, known as chemical recycling. Through this approach, with the help of catalysts, heat, and/or pressure, a plastic type is converted into its starting material (monomers that can be repolymerized to yield virgin-like plastics), other raw chemicals, or fuels. Being capable of cleaning the waste at the molecular level, chemical recycling represent a valuable solution to produce high-quality plastic feedstock.

Despite their promise, most chemical recycling processes are not yet economically attractive. However, our commitment to building a circular economy which requires significant improvement in the end-of-life management of plastics has stimulated a great deal of interest and investment towards making the technology more economically and energetically favourable. One strategy is to combine mechanical and chemical recycling in a single facility where, for example, the residues of mechanical recycling could be refined by chemical processes.

The years to come are expected to see a growth in technology and value chain development with respect to chemical and depolymerization techniques. The adoption of this approach also calls for the introduction of new technical standards to facilitate the use of virgin-grade recycled polymer in the same applications of virgin polymers. Comparing mechanical and chemical recycling processes through the life cycle assessment methodology help determine which approach offers better environmental performance for specific plastic types. Next to the advancement in mechanical recycling and sorting techniques, these efforts can pave the road for meeting our plastic recycling goals in the next decades.

by 5REDO

5R Solutions in the Vancouver Globe Forum 2020

In February of 2020, another Globe Forum event, by Globe Series, took place in Vancouver. It brought together the stakeholders in the sustainable and clean economy from Canada and around the world to share knowledge and identify collaborative opportunities. Besides talks and panel discussions, the Forum featured an Innovation Showcase in five thematic clusters of Bioeconomy/Circular Economy, Mobility, Smart Cities, Carbon Productivity, and Oceans and Plastics.

In this article, we review some of the 5R solutions displayed in this exhibition. At 5REDO, we help businesses assess and implement these 5R strategies to enhance circularity across their operations.

Renew
Turning waste into carbon. Titan Clean Energy Projects in Saskatchewan is converting wood and agricultural residues into carbon-rich substances for applications ranging from animal feed additives to soil amendments. The company also processes this biocarbon, also known as biochar, into activated carbon which owing to its porous structure can be used as an absorbent in, for example, water and air purification.

Painting with soybeans. Soyaoil Coatings Canada in Ontario has developed sustainable paints and coatings made of 98% plant-based and natural mineral ingredients.

Binding clay through enzymes. Cypher Environmental in Manitoba is offering an enzyme-based biodegradable road stabilizer called EarthZyme that increases the density and mechanical strength of soils with high clay content and therefore improves the durability of the infrastructure built upon them.

Hemping the composites. Natural Fibre Technologies in Alberta is processing locally sourced hemp stems into fibers and wood chips next to manufacturing biocomposites and added value products from these natural resources.

Recycle
Breaking carbon bonds. Pyrowave in Quebec has invented a microwave catalytic depolymerization technology that can break down polymers such as polystyrene (PS), polypropylene (PP) and polyethylene (PE) into their basic constituents, which can be used to make new plastic resins identical to virgin plastics.

Squeezing out aerosol cans. Despray Environmental based in the Netherlands has designed a unique system to recapture all liquid, metal and gas resources embodied in aerosol containers. The recovered propane is compressed back to a liquid state for reuse as fuel.

Reduce and Reuse
Dispensing with the bottles. Bevi based in Massachusetts is manufacturing flavored and sparkling water dispensers for offices. Besides reducing the consumption of bottles in mass-produced beverages, the company is offering service to its customers with refilling and reusing the flavor containers placed in its machines.

Remanufacture
Giving second life to IT devices. Compugen in British Columbia administers an IT asset disposition program called Green4Good in which aged IT equipment go through a refurbishment and/or recycle process aiming to maintain the value of parts and materials in the cycle.

by 5REDO

The Enabling Role of Logistics for the Circular Economy

Let me start this article with a question. If you look around in your house, how many cell phones can you find that are not being used anymore? I myself traced four mobile phones, two of them sitting in a box from 10 years ago. Given the presence of some precious metals in these devices, I feel responsible for preventing their embodied resources to flow back in the material supply chain. The situation is more alarming when we consider the rapid rise in discarded electronics, such as phones, laptops, fridges, sensors, and TVs, that are not only contributing to a huge loss of resources but also containing substances that pose environmental and health risks.

In circular economy, we are aiming to maintain the value of parts and materials for as long as possible. Implementing circular strategies requires understanding both the technical feasibility and the logistics needed to recover and redistribute materials effectively. This entails much more control over the flow of products to ensure that circular strategies such as repair, remanufacture, and reuse can be efficiently used over several lives of each product. In this regard, logistics and transportation operations play critical roles in the success of circular business models and the scaled-up implementation of circular economy approaches across industries.

For a long time, the forward logistics has powered global trade through the transport of materials, goods and information. And now, with our goal of advancing towards circular economy, the reverse logistics becomes more and more important to manage the return, recovery and remanufacture of products entering the economy.

This aspect of circular economy can certainly benefit significantly from the rapidly growing field of digitization, e.g., the Internet of Things, to enable seamless tracking of products during the use phase, besides facilitating return and recovery planning. The collected data can also guide future design and decision making to optimize the execution of circular strategies.

Needless to say that in a holistic approach, the benefits of logistics activities to circular economy can only be realized and maximized when combined with other strategies. For example, encouraging consumers to participate in return logistics may call for awarding customers for return, or adopting a use-based business model, in which manufacturer retains product ownership and customers pay for the use.

In addition, some of the challenges imposed on the logistics of circular economy, such as poor predictability of material streams and small batches, signifies the importance of collaboration and network building to speed up our transition to large-scale and cost efficient uptake of circular strategies.

Going back to the example of mobile phones and the resources lost when these devices reach to their end-of-use term, companies like Fairphone, based in the Netherlands, has built the business model and the logistics to recycle old mobile phones besides offering its own brand of cell phone that is more obliging to the principles of the circular economy, particularly repairability and remanufacturability. Such business initiatives are important and need to be extended to other electronic devices as a means to address the growing e-waste problem.

by 5REDO