Researcher is awarded SEK 500,000 for - Innventia.com · kommer hon att vistas sex månader på ......

Beyond is published by INNVENTIA AB | Legally responsible for the publication: Birgitta Sundblad ([email protected]) Editor: Marianne Lockner ([email protected]) | ISSN: 1652-6503 | Print: SIB-Tryck, Norsborg

INNVENTIA ABBox 5604, SE-114 86 Stockholm, SwedenPhone: +46 8 676 70 00Fax: +46 8 411 55 [email protected] www.innventia.com

LignoBoost Demo AB www.innventia.com/lignoboost

Subsidiaries:

Innventia UK Ltd.www.innventia.com/edge

PFI ASwww.pfi.no

Member of the INNVENTIA group Boosting business with science

BHave you changed address?Let us know by sending an e-mail to [email protected].

CUSTOMER MAGAZINE INNVENTIA GROUP

f3 guides decision-makers on renewable fuels

Indian research institute chooses OptiTopo

Global consumers demand smarter packaging

The release party for the report Packaging 2020 was the start of a series of exciting events at

Innventia. 2013 will be a very special year. We’ll be celebrating ten years as a ‘super institute’. And just like any ten-year-old, we’re always keen to learn new things, push the boundaries and let our imagination run free. Combine that with all

the experience and knowledge we’ve built up over the course of more than 70 years, and we’re sure

there will be many more years to come.

Researcher is awarded SEK 500,000 for carbon fibre research

Collaboration for change

LignoBoost makes its world première

On our mind: Forest-based new materials

#1/2013

Innventia’s Hannah Schweinebarth has been awarded this year’s Skills Prize by the Gunnar Sundblad Research Foundation. The prize of SEK 500,000 will be used to develop new knowledge on the production of carbon fibre from the wood raw material lignin.

Hannah is a young employee at Innventia’s Biorefinery Processes and Products group. There, she carries out research within the focus area Lignin & Carbon, which covers the entire lignin production chain from black liquor to end products, such as lightweight carbon fibre materials.

Carbon fibre is strong and light, with many applications, especially in the automotive industry. Today, demand is mainly limited by the high cost, with the petroleum-based raw materials and fibre spinning accounting for around 50 percent of the cost. Lignin, a substance that is found in wood but removed dur-ing kraft pulp production, has great potential for use as a raw material for manufacturing carbon fibre. Innventia has extensive experience in the produc-tion and characterisation of lignin from black liquor. The LignoBoost process, for example (see page 2) makes it possible to extract a very pure lignin that could be used as a raw material for carbon fibre.

Thanks to the Skills Prize, Hannah will be spending six months at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) in Tennessee, USA. ORNL is one of the world’s leading “green energy” research

centres, and is cur-rently building a pilot plant which will pro-duce about 25 tonnes of carbon fibre from lignin each year. This will enable Hannah to learn more about the proper-ties of lignin and how they affect the proper-ties of carbon fibre. The University of Tennessee will also be involved.

“It’s great fun!” says Hannah. “The prize represents an excellent opportunity for devel-opment, both profes-sionally and personally. I get to come to a new country and an envi-ronment that provides completely new aspects for what I’m doing. I think that lignin offers tremendous potential, and it’s fun to be involved.”

“Carbon fibre from lignin is a new and expanding area for us, and one where we are now investing in more advanced equipment for further devel-opment,” says Peter Axegård, Director of Innventia’s Biorefining business area. “Knowledge building is also very impor-tant in terms of acquiring the necessary skills. We are therefore looking forward to this collaboration with ORNL, which will benefit Sweden and Innventia in many ways.”

contact: [email protected] [email protected]

Hannah Schweinebarth har tilldelats årets Kompetensutvecklingspris från Stiftelsen Gunnar Sundblads Forskningsfond. Tack vare priset på 500 000 kr kommer hon att vistas sex månader på Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) för att lära sig mer om ligninets egenskaper och hur det påverkar kolfibrernas egenskaper. Innventia har lång erfarenhet av att framställa och karakterisera lignin från svartlut. Bland annat har man tillsammans med Chalmers utvecklat LignoBoostprocessen (numera ägd av Metso) som gör det möjligt att utvinna ett mycket rent lignin som skulle kunna användas som råvara för kolfiber. Kolfiber från lignin är ett nytt och expansivt område där Innventia nu bland annat investerar i en mer avancerad utrustning för vidare utveckling.


2 | Beyond #1/2013 Current awareness from the Innventia Group Beyond #1/2013 | 3Current awareness from the Innventia Group

En växande global medelklass, en åldrande befolkning, begränsad råva-rutillgång och en intensifierad urbanise-ring är några av de megatrender som utmanar produkt- och förpackningsindu-strin. Innventia har tillsammans med Kairos Future genomfört en studie bland konsu-menter i Sverige, Indien och USA som bl.a. visar att förpackningens material, och inte bara dess utseende, styr våra köpbeslut. Resultaten visar också på en tydlig efter-frågan och ett stort behov av smartare förpackningar. I framtiden kommer vi även att se striktare krav på förpackningsmate-rial som är i kontakt med livsmedel. För förpackningsindustrin kommer den väx-ande online-shoppingen att innebära både utmaningar och möjligheter samtidigt som jakten på högkvalitativ råvara stärker åter-vinnarnas ställning i värdekedjan.


On 21 January, the Innventia Global Outlook Report Packaging 2020 was released. This report includes results from an international study, carried out in association with Kairos Future, presenting a market scenario perspective for 2020 on consumer packaging.

The report describes seven global forces and their impact on the packaging indus-try and the packaging of the future. The conclusions are based on a survey carried out among consumers in the US, India and Sweden. A clear majority of the 1,500 interviewees see major problems with society’s consumption of packag-ing. There are particular concerns about the environmental impact of packaging in India, where a full 60 percent are prepared to go so far as to avoid purchas-ing a specific product if the packaging is seen to be environmentally unfriendly. The corresponding figure in Sweden is

20 percent. Plastic packaging is deemed to be the biggest environmental villain among Americans and Indians, while it is mainly aluminium packaging that Swedes shy away from.

There are demands for tougher qual-ity controls and stricter environmen-tal legislation, and a clear majority of consumers in all three countries would like to see somewhat stricter or much stricter environmental legislation.

Global consumers – particularly those in Sweden – are keen to see more innovative packaging. For exam-ple, three out of five (63 percent) would like to be able to scan goods to find out more about their origin and delivery, as well as detailed information about the content.

“A growing global middle class, an aging population, limited access to raw materials and intensified urbanisation are a few of the megatrends posing challenges for the product and pack-aging industry,” says Fredrik Rosén, Manager of the Market and Consumer

Insight group at Innventia. “We’re see-ing purchasing decisions being guided by the packaging material itself, not just the appearance of the packaging. We’re also seeing a clear demand and a great need for smarter packaging. In the future, stricter demands will be placed on packaging materials that come into contact with foodstuffs. The growth in online shopping will bring both chal-lenges and opportunities for the pack-aging industry. For example, will the brown cardboard boxes that products are usually shipped in today still be as brown and boring in the future, or will they become an important part of branding? When it comes to the pack-aging value chain, as the quest for high quality raw materials intensifies, recy-cling players will occupy a significantly stronger position. And it’s not unlikely that we’ll see structural collaboration, whereby recyclers become involved in other parts of the value chain.”

contact: [email protected]

Since the release on 21 January, the Packaging 2020 report has gained a lot of attention and we have now made a reprint to meet the demand. Order your copy on www.innventia.com/packaging2020.

Den första kommersiella LignoBoost-anläggningen är nu i drift vid Domtars massabruk i Plymouth. BioChoice lignin är Domtars namn på produkten och produktionen i Plymouth, som ligger på 75 ton per dag, började i februari i år. Ligninet är avsett att användas som bl.a. biobaserat alternativ till olja och andra fossila bränslen eller som råvara till kolfiber. LignoBoost är en effektiv teknik för uttag av högkvalitativt lignin från sulfatmassabruk. Tekniken, som utvecklats av Innventia i samarbete med Chalmers tekniska högskola inom ramen för tre forskningsprogram sedan slutet av 90-talet, såldes 2008 till teknikföretaget Metso. Utvecklingen av tekniken fortgår alltjämt. Metso och Innventia arbetar sedan 2008 tillsammans för att förfina tek-niken och utveckla nya ligninapplikationer tillsammans med potentiella kunder.

makes its world première

LignoBoostOn 12 March, 2013, the North American pulp and paper company Domtar announced that it had started the operation of a facility for separating lignin from the process at its pulp mill in Plymouth, North Carolina. The facility is the first of its kind in the world on a commercial scale, based on the LignoBoost technology.

The successful installation of the LignoBoost facility represents the cul-mination of a research and technol-ogy project that Domtar began in 2010. BioChoice lignin is Domtar’s name for the product, and production in Plymouth – around 75 tonnes per day – began in February this year. The lignin is intended to be used for a wide range of industrial applications, for example as a bio-based alternative to oil and other fossil fuels, or as a raw material for other materials.

LignoBoost is a unique and effec-tive process for extracting high-quality lignin from kraft pulp mills, and has generated a great deal of interest – both

in Sweden and internationally. The technology has been developed since the late 1990s by Innventia in Stockholm, in association with Chalmers University of Technology, within the framework of three research programmes. In 2008, Innventia sold the LignoBoost concept to the technology company Metso, which is now delivering the first facility to Domtar.

“It’s extremely gratifying to see the technology being installed on a full scale,” says Innventia’s Per Tomani, one of the people behind LignoBoost. “Having worked on this right from the beginning, it’s a very special day when production goes live. Lots of people have been involved in the various R&D activities along the way, and I’m sure they all feel the same way too.”

The technology is continuously improved. Metso and Innventia have been working together since 2008 to refine the technology and to develop new lignin applications in partnership with potential customers. Lignin is one of the main focus areas for Innventia’s research and development, and the work is being carried out in association with customers within the industry.

“It would be fantastic if this were to represent a reversal of the trend,” con-tinues Per. “It creates opportunities for developing kraft pulp mills into mod-ern biorefineries that can supply large volumes of products beside the tradi-tional fibre products and by-products – primarily tall oil and electricity.”


The production of BioChoice lignin at Domtar’s pulp mill in Plymouth, North Carolina, began in February. Lars-Erik Åkerlund from Innventia (holding the sign in green helmet) participated.

Per Tomani, Innventia is one of the creators of the LignoBoost technology.

LignoBoost at your millLignoBoost is one of the technologies available and ready for use to develop your biorefinery concept. Since 2008, the LignoBoost technology is owned and commercialised by Metso.

Innventia offer:

•LignoBoost process evaluation and pre-studies together with Metso.

•Modelling (material, Na/S, energy and water balances including a techno-economical assessment) for integra-ting the LignoBoost concept into your pulp mill.

•Process development to improve the biorefinery possibilities.

•R & D projects tailor-made for your purposes.

•Large scale production in the LignoBoost demonstration plant.

4 | Beyond #1/2013 Current awareness from the Innventia Group Beyond #1/2013 | 5Current awareness from the Innventia Group

On our mind

Av huvudkomponenterna i ved kan vi idag förädla både lignin och cellulosa medan hemicellulosa utgör en outnyttjad resurs. Hemicellulosa är en polysackarid med intressanta egenskaper för tänkbara produkter som t.ex papperskemikalie, barriärmaterial och nya kompositmaterial. Innventia har ett engagerat team med djup expertis som täcker hela värdekedjan; från fiberlinjen, separationsprocesser, kemiska modifieringar och produktegenskaper till kemiska analyser, materialanalyser och systemanalys. Alla dessa kunskaper förenas nu för att ta fram en ny attraktiv produktionsprocess av hemicellulosaprodukter baserad på restströmmar i massabruket.

f3 (Fossil Free Fuels) är ett rikstäckande kunskapscentrum för förnybara drivmedel där Innventia som aktiv partner bidrar med kompetens inom massaoch pappersindustrin samt kunskap om processer för produktion av biobränsle. Ett av projekten syftar till att utveckla en modell för att bestämma och undersöka ekonomiskt optimala platser i Sverige för tillverkning av ”andra generationens” biodrivmedel. Ett annat projekt ska identifiera förutsättningarna för produktion av biometan från massabruk.

Som ett led i utvecklingen av en internationaliseringsstrategi har Innventia kartlagt F&U med anknyting till biobränslen i Brasilien.

on different scales is an important skill for us, since clear effects in the lab can give different outcomes on a full fac-tory scale. The goal is a full-scale factory process.

One example of an interesting appli-cation for hemicellulose from pulp mill residue streams is materials for oxygen barriers. Working together with its part-ners, Innventia has created hemicellulose films with excellent barrier properties and high strength from various pulp mill residue streams. In future, this material could replace aluminium, polyethylene and other non-renewable layers in food packaging. Examples of potential residue streams include wood hydrolysate, black liquor and process water from mechani-cal pulp mills. Wood hydrolysate can be a residual product from dissolving pulp plants that produce pulp for textile fibres, for example. As more and more plants are converted from paper pulp production to dissolving pulp produc-tion, more and more hydrolysate will become available. In dissolving pulp, hemicellulose damages or destroys the pulp product. It is therefore particularly relevant to find new application areas for hemicellulose that can create income for the pulp mill.


It is a matter of biorefinery. Of the three main components of wood, we can currently refine both lignin and cel-lulose to create a number of products, while hemicellulose remains an unused resource. Hemicellulose is a polysaccha-ride with interesting properties for pos-sible products such as paper chemicals, barrier materials and new composite materials. It is also a matter of what we call residue streams, the value of which currently lies solely in their heat con-tent. We want to base the processes and products of tomorrow on this unused resource.

Innventia has a committed team with in-depth expertise spanning the entire value chain for hemicellulose – from the fibre line, separation processes, chemical modifications and product properties, to chemical analyses, material analyses and system analyses. Our new focus involves bringing all this knowledge together to develop a new and attractive produc-tion process for hemicellulose products, based on pulp mill residue streams. We are working towards effective separation and upgrading. This is essential, since the valuable component often exists in low concentrations, together with many other components. We are also develop-ing new ways to modify hemicellulose in order to create a product with the desired properties. Development work

Hemicelluloses belong to a family of polysaccharides with interesting properties for possible products such as paper chemicals, barrier materials and new composite materials. Innventia is teaming up for the development of new production process.

By Sverker Danielsson

Innventia is an active partner in f3 (Fossil Free Fuels), established as a nationwide knowledge platform for cooperation between universities, research institutes and industry in the production of renewable fuels and the related system aspects.

Forest-based new materials


Transportation fuels produced from renewable raw materials will be an important component of a strategy to reduce both greenhouse gas emissions and our dependence on petroleum. The EU has set ambitious targets in the Renewable Energy Directive, and the Swedish government has established a vision for the Swedish transport industry to function without fossil fuels by 2030.

The Swedish Knowledge Centre for Renewable Fuels (f3) is a nationwide centre, which through cooperation and a systems approach contributes to the development of sustainable fossil-free fuels for transportation. Through joint efforts by the centre’s partners, the centre performs syntheses of current research into the production of renew-able fuels as well as supplementary research, such as comparative systems analyses of fuels, processes, raw materi-als and plant design.

The centre’s partners The outcomes provide guidance for policy-makers, government, industry and other organisations that need to

make decisions about the production of renewable fuels. Examples of such areas include policy objectives and policy instruments to achieve established goals, investment in R&D and investments for infrastructure and production.

Innventia is an active partner in sev-eral projects funded by the f3 centre, contributing our competence in the pulp and paper industry and our knowledge of processes for biofuel production.

One of the projects, “Optimal locali-sation of second generation biofuel pro-duction in Sweden”, aims to develop a model which can be used to determine and investigate economically optimal locations in Sweden for the produc-tion of “second generation” biofuels (e.g. from lignocellulosic feedstocks). The effects of different biofuel targets and different boundary conditions are being examined. Examples of questions to be answered include what type(s) of biofuel should be produced, where and what quantities. Preliminary results show that pulp and paper mills are among the most interesting sites for cost-effective production of biofuels.

Further information•Saadatmand, S., U. Edlund, A.-C.

Albertsson, S. Danielsson and O. Dahlman (2012). “Prehydrolysis in Softwood Pulping Produces a Valuable Biorefinery Fraction for Material Utilization.” Environmental Science & Technology 46(15): 8389-8396.

•Johanna Persson, Licentiate thesis 2012 “Birch xylan modification by lactide grafting”

•Jasna Stevanic Srndovic PhD thesis (2011) “Interactions between Wood Polymers in Wood Cell Walls and Cellulose/Hemicellulose Biocomposites”

Another ongoing project initiated and led by Innventia is “The value chain for biomethane from the forest industry”. The project aims to identify the prereq-uisites for successful biomethane pro-jects at mills, including production scale, integration efficiencies and distance to market. An outcome will be to suggest a possible introduction strategy where pulp mills can go from small-to-medium scale production of biogas, via anaero-bic digestion, to larger scale produc-tion via gasification. Another possible option could be contributing to syngas production in municipal combined heat, power and fuel production systems by supplying different kinds of biomass raw materials.

Innventia is also involved in develop-ing an internationalisation strategy for f3 and has been mapping R&D activities and actors related to biofuels in Brazil, as well as possibilities for collaboration with f3.

contact: [email protected] and [email protected]

Universities•Chalmers•KTH Royal Institute of Technology•LU, Lund University•SLU, Swedish University of

Agricultural Sciences•Bio4Energy*

Industry•Preem•Perstorp•Göteborg Energi•E.ON Sweden•Sekab Etechnology•Volvo Technology•Scania

Funding•Swedish Energy Agency•Region of Västra Götaland

Research Institutes•SP Technical Research

Institute of Sweden•IVL Swedish Environmental

Research Institute•Innventia

* Collaboration between Umeå University, Luleå University of Technology and SLU in Umeå.

The partners of the Swedish Knowledge Centre for Renewable Fuels (f3).

Niklas and Anna in front of a flexifuel car. The pulp and paper mills are among the most interesting sites for costeffective production of biofuels.

Sverker Danielsson, Ph.D.Researcher & Project Manager, Biorefinery Processes and Products, Team Manager Focus Area HemicelluloseAsk me about: Chemical pulping, Hemicellulose, Separation processesHidden talent: Excellent snow racer rider

6 | Beyond #1/2013 Current awareness from the Innventia Group Beyond #1/2013 | 7Current awareness from the Innventia Group Current awareness from the Innventia Group Beyond #1/2012 | 7

Utvecklingen mot en bioeko-nomi ses som en lösning för att möta utmaningar från klimat och resursfrågor och öka Europas konkurrenskraft. Små och medelstora företag är en mycket viktig drivkraft och teknologileverantör för förändring mot produkter som nya material, kemikalier och energi. Målet med vårt samarbete är att ditt företags produkter och processlösningar skall bli bättre och konkurrenskraftigare. I en utvecklingsspiral från idé till utveckling och kommersialisering kan stöd fås i många olika former, t ex genom innovationsprojekt eller support och teknisk expertis vid ansökningar. Vi har tillgång till såväl labb och pilotutrustning som nätverk av andra forskningsinstitut, högskolor och universitet.

Det indiska forskningsinstitutet Central Pulp & Paper Research Institute har valt Innventias metod OptiTopo för att mäta topografi. Pappers och kartongytan har stor betydelse för kvalitet på tryckt bild och text. Genom att mäta ytjämnhet med OptiTopo och filtrera data på lämpligt sätt kan tryckresultatet förutsägas.

För institutet innebär detta en stor kvalitetsförbättring. Möjligheten att förstå och utvärdera resultatet för mätningen är mycket större med OptiTopo än med det gamla instrumentet eftersom bland annat upplösningen är bättre och bildanalysbehandling görs.

Evolving towards a bioeconomy is seen as a solution to counteract the challeng-es posed by climate and resource issues and to boost Europe’s competitiveness. The forest industry faces a transforma-tion that brings great opportunities – but also challenges. The Swedish Forest Industries Federation’s vision is to double value added between now and 2035, with half of this increase coming from new products – anything from new materials to chemicals and energy. In order to achieve this vision, new technology is needed, both in processes and in product development. Small and medium-sized enterprises are extremely important driving forces and providers of tech-nology for such a change.

The aim of our collaboration is to make your com-pany’s products and process solu-tions better and more competitive. We envisage a devel-opment spiral, from initial idea to develop-ment and commercialisa-tion, in which support is available in many different forms. We know that col-laboration within research, development and innovation is a success factor. Our experience has shown that small and medium-sized enterprises are different, and that the support provided must also be differ-ent. It also shows that companies are currently at different stages within the development spiral.

We can therefore work together in a number of different ways.

In an innovation project, we devel-op your processes or products. Here, Innventia’s experts offer powerful sup-port. We also have a large number of labs and pilot facilities, which can be valuable tools for you in your develop-ment process. National research pro-grammes or EU framework programmes are important in terms of a company’s technical development in order to build up knowledge and networks. We can

India’s Central Pulp & Paper Research Institute (CPPRI) has chosen Innventia’s OptiTopo method to measure topogra-phy. The surface of paper and board is extremely important in terms of printed image and text quality. By measuring surface smoothness using OptiTopo and filtering the data in an appropriate way, printing results can be predicted.

“This will bring a significant improve-ment in quality for CPPRI, which previously used a Parker Print Surf (PPS) instrument for this purpose,” says Innventia’s Hans Christiansson. “OptiTopo offers much better oppor-tunities for understanding and evaluat-ing measurement results than the PPS instrument. For example, the resolution is better and image analysis processing is carried out.”

Hans travelled to Saharanpur with retailer PTI to install the OptiTopo instrument on 28-29 January.

The surface smoothness instrument OptiTopo was developed by Innventia, and is a fast, unique method for cor-relation between paper surface and print defects. It has now been installed in Finland, India, Sweden, Thailand, Germany and Austria.


help you with the entire process, from initial discussions to assisting you with applications, budgets and implementa-tion, while also providing technical expertise. We work together with other research institutes, colleges and univer-sities, and can thereby also identify the right expertise for your development.


Collaboration for changeSmall and mediumsized enterprises – a driving force in the development of the forestbased bioeconomy

Register for our SME event on 24 Aprilwww.innventia.com/SME-seminarium

9 APRILAFORE Workshop

23 APRILMedical Packaging Conference 2013

24 APRILSME seminar on the woodbased bioeconomy

27 APRILTAPPI PaperCon 2013

16 MAyPenn State Plant Biology Symposium

21-22 MAyBoostEff Final Conference

26 MAyInternational Conference on Multiphase Flow 2013

10 jUnE IAPRI Symposium on Packaging 2013

12 jUnE ISWFPC Symposium

For further information on coming events, see www.innventia.com

coming events

25-27 March, 2014Stockholm Waterfront Congress Centre

The Nordic Wood Biorefinery Conference (NWBC), is the leading meeting forum for wood biorefinery professionals. NWBC gathers expert speakers from the chemical, energy, pulp and paper industry as well as recognized representatives from the global research community. NWBC is jointly organised by Innventia and VTT.


Innventia continuously develops equipment for the biorefinery pro-cess. Recently, we upgraded the large custom-designed reactor which is an important tool for separating the dif-ferent wood components. Pulp or cel-lulose can be produced by various delig-nification methods in the reactor and the different main components in the wood can be separated. A fraction con-taining a high content of hemicellulose can, for example, be extracted after a pre-hydrolysis of the wood. Black liquor, i.e. cooking liquid, can be further processed with the LignoBoost process for lignin extraction and isolation.

Another advantage with the reactor is that it is possibly to produce up to 18 kg pulp or dissolving pulp to be used for further studies that requires large amounts of pulp, for instance in refining studies using Voith laboratory refiners.

The reactor is used in the cluster research programme but is also availa-ble for contract work.


Book the next Nordic Wood Biorefinery

Conference

Save the date!Innventia customer event

21-23 October, 2013


new biorefinery reactor

Training staff at the Central Pulp & Paper Research Institute in Saharanpur, India

Laboratory engineer Mikaela Michael showing Innventia’s new reactor in the cooking and bleaching plant at Innventia.

Hans Christiansson in front of the OptiTopo equipment at Innventia image analysis laboratory.

Collaboration with

InnVEnTIA

VInnOVA Research &

Grow

national R&I programmes

EU projectsInnovation

cheques

Innovative ideas

Beyond is published by INNVENTIA AB | Legally responsible for the publication: Birgitta Sundblad ([email protected]) Editor: Marianne Lockner ([email protected]) | ISSN: 1652-6503 | Print: SIB-Tryck, Norsborg

INNVENTIA ABBox 5604, SE-114 86 Stockholm, SwedenPhone: +46 8 676 70 00Fax: +46 8 411 55 [email protected] www.innventia.com

LignoBoost Demo AB www.innventia.com/lignoboost

Subsidiaries:

Innventia UK Ltd.www.innventia.com/edge

PFI ASwww.pfi.no

Member of the INNVENTIA group Boosting business with science

BHave you changed address?Let us know by sending an e-mail to [email protected].

CUSTOMER MAGAZINE INNVENTIA GROUP




The release party for the report Packaging 2020 was the start of a series of exciting events at

Innventia. 2013 will be a very special year. We’ll be celebrating ten years as a ‘super institute’. And just like any ten-year-old, we’re always keen to learn new things, push the boundaries and let our imagination run free. Combine that with all

the experience and knowledge we’ve built up over the course of more than 70 years, and we’re sure

there will be many more years to come.


Collaboration for change

LignoBoost makes its world première

On our mind: Forest-based new materials

#1/2013

Innventia’s Hannah Schweinebarth has been awarded this year’s Skills Prize by the Gunnar Sundblad Research Foundation. The prize of SEK 500,000 will be used to develop new knowledge on the production of carbon fibre from the wood raw material lignin.

Hannah is a young employee at Innventia’s Biorefinery Processes and Products group. There, she carries out research within the focus area Lignin & Carbon, which covers the entire lignin production chain from black liquor to end products, such as lightweight carbon fibre materials.

Carbon fibre is strong and light, with many applications, especially in the automotive industry. Today, demand is mainly limited by the high cost, with the petroleum-based raw materials and fibre spinning accounting for around 50 percent of the cost. Lignin, a substance that is found in wood but removed dur-ing kraft pulp production, has great potential for use as a raw material for manufacturing carbon fibre. Innventia has extensive experience in the produc-tion and characterisation of lignin from black liquor. The LignoBoost process, for example (see page 2) makes it possible to extract a very pure lignin that could be used as a raw material for carbon fibre.

Thanks to the Skills Prize, Hannah will be spending six months at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) in Tennessee, USA. ORNL is one of the world’s leading “green energy” research

centres, and is cur-rently building a pilot plant which will pro-duce about 25 tonnes of carbon fibre from lignin each year. This will enable Hannah to learn more about the proper-ties of lignin and how they affect the proper-ties of carbon fibre. The University of Tennessee will also be involved.

“It’s great fun!” says Hannah. “The prize represents an excellent opportunity for devel-opment, both profes-sionally and personally. I get to come to a new country and an envi-ronment that provides completely new aspects for what I’m doing. I think that lignin offers tremendous potential, and it’s fun to be involved.”

“Carbon fibre from lignin is a new and expanding area for us, and one where we are now investing in more advanced equipment for further devel-opment,” says Peter Axegård, Director of Innventia’s Biorefining business area. “Knowledge building is also very impor-tant in terms of acquiring the necessary skills. We are therefore looking forward to this collaboration with ORNL, which will benefit Sweden and Innventia in many ways.”

contact: [email protected] [email protected]

Hannah Schweinebarth har tilldelats årets Kompetensutvecklingspris från Stiftelsen Gunnar Sundblads Forskningsfond. Tack vare priset på 500 000 kr kommer hon att vistas sex månader på Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) för att lära sig mer om ligninets egenskaper och hur det påverkar kolfibrernas egenskaper. Innventia har lång erfarenhet av att framställa och karakterisera lignin från svartlut. Bland annat har man tillsammans med Chalmers utvecklat LignoBoostprocessen (numera ägd av Metso) som gör det möjligt att utvinna ett mycket rent lignin som skulle kunna användas som råvara för kolfiber. Kolfiber från lignin är ett nytt och expansivt område där Innventia nu bland annat investerar i en mer avancerad utrustning för vidare utveckling.


Researcher is awarded SEK 500,000 for - Innventia.com · kommer hon att vistas sex månader på ......

Documents

Transcript of Researcher is awarded SEK 500,000 for - Innventia.com · kommer hon att vistas sex månader på ......