Life cycle assessment of chemically treated and copper coated sustainable biocomposites.

ABSTRACT

The current demand for composites reinforced with renewable fibers is greater than it has ever been. In comparison to glass fibers, natural fibers yield the advantages of lesser density and cost. Although comparable specific properties exist between glass and natural fibers, the latter shows lower strength. However, with the copper coating and chemical treatment of natural fibers, the strength of the composites can be increased nowadays. The current research investigation focuses on the life cycle assessment of the raw, chemically treated, and copper coated fiber reinforced bagasse and banana composites to compare the emissions on the environment of these samples to prove their applicability. The study includes all the processes, from the extraction of fibers to the formation of composites, i.e., from cradle to gate, and detailed inventory. The ReCiPe H midpoint method has been utilized in SimaPro software to quantify the emissions. The results indicate that the maximum global warming emission is due to the energy consumption used during the manufacturing of these composites. Electricity contribution for chemically treated and copper coated composites in global warming contribution is slightly greater than that of raw composites i.e., 73.275 % in C- BG/P, 73.06 % in Cu- BG/P, 73.65 % in C- BN/P and 74.28 % in Cu- BN/P which is comparatively higher than 63.8 % in R- BG/P and 64.97 % in R- BN/P. The next major contributions come from polylactic acid for all the three samples of bagasse fiber reinforced PLA composite and banana fiber reinforced PLA composite. The raw samples also show improved fiber strength compared to chemical and copper coated samples.