TY - JOUR
T1 - A review of environmental assessments of biobased against petrochemical adhesives
AU - Eisen, Anna
AU - Bussa, Maresa
AU - Röder, Hubert
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2020 Elsevier Ltd
PY - 2020/12/20
Y1 - 2020/12/20
N2 - Bio-based adhesives could be an important addition to dispersion- and solvent-based adhesives due to increasing environmental and health requirements. This could also improve the environmental impact of many composite products. The aim of this review is to examine whether adhesive technologies have already been investigated for their environmental impact and if so, which biomass has been used for which type of adhesive. For this purpose corresponding studies were conducted and a total of 563 different peer-reviewed articles on adhesives identified. These articles were then evaluated in a 2-step screening process. Articles in which adhesives themselves, and not just composite products, have already been examined with regard to their environmental impact have been analyzed in detail to determine whether adhesive technologies based on renewable raw materials have significant better environmental performance than conventional reference products. The results provide a comprehensive critical overview of the latest developments in the industry. It becomes clear that the environmental performance of industrial bio-based adhesives is still very controversial and mostly based on assumptions of theoretical and unproven products. The fact that many of the conversion technologies used are still only tested in the laboratory or in the pilot phase and have not yet been implemented to an industrially relevant extent still represents a significant obstacle to the implementation of novel bio-based value chains and leads to additional uncertainties in the decision-making process. However, 70% of the theoretical adhesives or existing adhesives, which also consist of only a fraction of renewable raw materials, show equally good or better environmental performance. Especially the impact category global warming and human toxicity indicate a high potential for improvement. In addition, it becomes clear that vegetable oils and starch are particularly suitable as biomass for the green production of adhesives. Although the literature shows a theoretical potential for industrial bio-based adhesives, the market is still immature and is based on a low development of bio-based adhesive options. Against this background, it must be the aim of further scientific work to fill this specific gap by modelling the life cycle of bio-based adhesives from an environmental and economic perspective, which shows the results clearly and transparently and thus also guarantees a good basis for decision makers.
AB - Bio-based adhesives could be an important addition to dispersion- and solvent-based adhesives due to increasing environmental and health requirements. This could also improve the environmental impact of many composite products. The aim of this review is to examine whether adhesive technologies have already been investigated for their environmental impact and if so, which biomass has been used for which type of adhesive. For this purpose corresponding studies were conducted and a total of 563 different peer-reviewed articles on adhesives identified. These articles were then evaluated in a 2-step screening process. Articles in which adhesives themselves, and not just composite products, have already been examined with regard to their environmental impact have been analyzed in detail to determine whether adhesive technologies based on renewable raw materials have significant better environmental performance than conventional reference products. The results provide a comprehensive critical overview of the latest developments in the industry. It becomes clear that the environmental performance of industrial bio-based adhesives is still very controversial and mostly based on assumptions of theoretical and unproven products. The fact that many of the conversion technologies used are still only tested in the laboratory or in the pilot phase and have not yet been implemented to an industrially relevant extent still represents a significant obstacle to the implementation of novel bio-based value chains and leads to additional uncertainties in the decision-making process. However, 70% of the theoretical adhesives or existing adhesives, which also consist of only a fraction of renewable raw materials, show equally good or better environmental performance. Especially the impact category global warming and human toxicity indicate a high potential for improvement. In addition, it becomes clear that vegetable oils and starch are particularly suitable as biomass for the green production of adhesives. Although the literature shows a theoretical potential for industrial bio-based adhesives, the market is still immature and is based on a low development of bio-based adhesive options. Against this background, it must be the aim of further scientific work to fill this specific gap by modelling the life cycle of bio-based adhesives from an environmental and economic perspective, which shows the results clearly and transparently and thus also guarantees a good basis for decision makers.
KW - Adhesive
KW - Case studies
KW - Isocyanate
KW - Life cycle assessment
KW - Polyurethane
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85091653307&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.jclepro.2020.124277
DO - 10.1016/j.jclepro.2020.124277
M3 - Review article
AN - SCOPUS:85091653307
SN - 0959-6526
VL - 277
JO - Journal of Cleaner Production
JF - Journal of Cleaner Production
M1 - 124277
ER -