Opportunities and threats to natural fibers in technical applications

Abstract

Natural fibers, such as flax, hemp, kenaf, coir, sisal and jute, are gaining increasing importance in automotive, aerospace, packaging, fiber-reinforced composites and other technical and industrial applications. This is due to the fact that natural fibers offer competitive specific tensile strength and stiffness, in some cases even better than glass fibers but fairly comparable to synthetic fibers, such as nylon, carbon and aramid (Figure 1). Besides, they offer other advantages, such as improved energy recovery, carbon dioxide sequestration, ease and flexibility of manufacturing, environmental friendliness and derived from renewable natural resources. However, the market scenario for the natural fibers is also changing due to the introduction of newer bio-degradable polymers, such as PLA synthesized from corn. Currently, some other biopolymers with properties similar to their petroleum origin counterparts, such as Bio-PET, PHA and PBT from naturally renewable resources, are under development, although they are developed with a view to replace petroleum based polymers but their fiber-forming properties may provide newer opportunities.