Furfuryl alcohol is a very interesting green molecule used in the production of biopolymers. In the present paper, the copolymerization in acid environment with natural, easily-available, phenolic derivatives is investigated. The processes of polymerization of the furfuryl alcohol with: (i) spent-liquor from the pulping industry and (ii) commercial tannin from acacia mimosa were investigated though viscometry and IR-spectroscopy. The curing kinetics of the formulations highlighted the importance of the amount of furfuryl alcohol and catalyst as well as the effect of temperature for both phenolic-furanic polymers. Evidence of covalent copolymerization has been observed through infrared spectrometry (FT-IR) combined with principal component analysis (PCA) and confirmed with additional solubility tests. These bio-based formulations were applied as adhesives for solid wood and particleboards with interesting results: at 180 • C, the spent-liquor furanic formulations allow wood bonding slightly with lower performance than PVA in dry conditions, while mixed formulations allow the gluing of particleboard with only satisfactory internal bonding tests.

Lignin foams are innovative materials obtained by the copolymerization of furanics with the spent liquor from the magnefite wood pulping process. In this study, the influence of the component amount in the formulation, as well as the effect of temperature on the final product, were elucidated. Several formulations, with various lignin/furanic ratios, blowing agents, and catalyst concentrations, exhibited good homogeneity and densities between 185 and 407 kg m -3 . The mechanical properties, as well as the thermal conductivities, confirmed the strong dependence on density, and the results obtained were comparable to that of tannin foams. The leaching tests revealed that the lignin foams released a certain amount of catalyst within the first minutes of water dipping. However the pH of this leachate stabilized quickly, which suggests that the catalyst can be easily recovered.