Green composites from natural fibers and biopolymers: A review on processing, properties, and applications

Abstract

At present, environmental sustainability is a big concern due to the limited resources and the adverse impacts of petroleum-based materials. Green composites (GCs) attracted intensive research interest for the last few decades from academicians, scientists, researchers, and practitioners both from the ecological and economic point of view and are presently being considered as one of the most promising research domains. Composites produced from renewable and/or natural resources thanks to their biodegradability and sustainability properties are envisaged as the next-generation materials to meet the growing demand worldwide. GCs are intensively investigated due to their multifunctional properties and utilization in a wide variety of fields including automobile, marine, aerospace, structural and infrastructural applications, packaging, electronics industry, sports, and biomedical applications. They also show potentials to replace the expensive as well as non-degradable petroleum-based composites. After the shelf life, it can be disposed of easily without harming the environment. The processing techniques, properties, and applications of green composites are comprehensively assessed in this review article. The feasibility of the naturally available fiber and polymers for green composites are also discussed highlighting the existing challenges with possible suggestions. It was intended to present a full overview of biodegradable polymer composites reinforced with natural fiber, as well as the necessary future directions for the concerned researchers.

Evaluation of the Strength of the Interface for Abaca Fiber Reinforced Hdpe and Biope Composite Materials, and Its Influence over Tensile Properties

“…Hence, the use of mineral fibers as reinforcement is a good means to obtain composite materials with increased mechanical properties but cannot be seen as the way to obtain cheaper or more environmentally friendly materials. Some efforts in the direction of obtaining materials more environmentally friendly than GF-reinforced composites have been made by using natural fibers instead of mineral ones [25,26]. Natural fibers come from a renewable source and in some cases can be obtained from agroforestry waste in the shape of straws, stalks, or stems.…”

“…Some authors emphasise that the use of natural fibers serves the three goals at the same time. On the one hand, the literature shows that obtaining composite materials with competitive mechanical properties by using natural fibers as reinforcement is possible [25,26,[29][30][31]. On the other hand, when one of the phases of the composite has a cost noticeably lower than the other phase, the resulting material is cheaper than the original matrix.…”

Unveiling new frontiers: Bast fiber‐reinforced polymer composites and their mechanical properties

“…Flax, hemp, jute, kenaf, and ramie are the most favored diversity of bast fibers. The digital image of various bast fibers and the producing plants are exhibited in Figure 5 38,39 …”

Multi-scale analysis of the mechanical behaviour of a flax fibre reinforced composite under low-velocity impact

“…The study of the mechanical and vibration behaviour of plant-reinforced composites shows that this material has interesting properties for various industrial applications. [1][2][3][4][5][6] Nevertheless, it is essential to fill in the steps necessary for the preliminary calculations for the design and manufacturing of engineering structures. As for composites with synthetic reinforcement, the aim would be to identify material parameters useful for a predictive calculation, whether analytical and/or numerical.…”