Isabella Peppard steps through a range of bio materials, their properties and uses. Some of these will be exhibited at Susty Spec: Biomaterials Exhibition and Launch Party event in Melbourne as part of Melbourne’s Design Week.
Biomaterials may seem futuristic, but the reality couldn’t be simpler. Biomaterials are what they sound like: materials derived from plants. These materials are non-extractive and don’t rely on mining practices. They are more likely to be biodegradable, breaking down into the ground at the end of life instead of creating waste in a landfill.
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They range from timber and bamboo to speculative products. Some are available on the Australian market – straw panels and recycled paper board, for instance. Others such as mycelium (from mushrooms) are more speculative.
We often refer to the concept of the full lifecycle of a product as cradle-to-grave and biomaterials are the most likely to achieve a low carbon or zero carbon impact. For example, after being used for construction at the 2000 Sydney Olympic Games, over 20,000 square metres of straw panel made in Bendigo, Victoria, was shredded in a mulcher and distributed as compost in gardens across Sydney.
The main advantage of using bio-based materials instead of recycled plastic products could be considered as avoiding toxic off-gassing substances or microplastics, which could arise from recycling plastic products into boards, for example. Plastic products rely on extractive processes such as crude oil.
Biomaterials that many will be familiar with are glue-laminated and cross-laminated timber structures. The argument for and against the use of these products has been widely debated. Speed of construction is commonly seen as an advantage of timber while availability and local supply has sometimes created challenges.
When timber structures, or other products such as wood-wool, need to be shipped from Europe to Australian the carbon intensive transport usually undermines the reduction in embodied carbon.
Fortunately, there are Australian growers of building products such as hemp and structural timber. Through this, projects can support local industry and reduce travel miles on their carbon budgets.
Hemp can be used for a number of uses such as a bio additive to concrete. Cannabis straw or hemp hurd is locally grown and processed in each state to produce a building grade material hurd for use in cast
Hemp lime or hempcrete construction projects.
Another exciting material is biobased epoxy made in South Australia.
This epoxy resin can be used as a sealant and binder as an alternative to products that contain toxic ingredients.
But if it were easy, everyone would be doing it
There are a number of challenges facing both start-up and longstanding manufacturing companies of biomaterials, including rating schemes and supply chain labels.
For example, the Australian Made label reflects a manufacturing process of being made in Australia rather than ingredients being sourced from Australia. The processing of raw materials could still be completed overseas, too, leaving it up to suppliers to meet the minimum requirements or do better.
Eco labels and rating schemes can focus on credits and percentage targets, which do not necessarily take ingredients or location into consideration. Declare label, for example, does publish ingredients lists, but focuses on avoiding certain toxic materials instead of championing natural materials.
These can raise a communications barrier, where most people specifying the products aren’t scientists, and they are unlikely to have the knowledge and time to research the ingredients.
Therefore, they may rely on an eco label endorsement without digging deeper to find a more natural product.
Mandates for government projects such as Local Jobs First can be used to enforce local sourcing; however, some schemes could allow Australia-wide sourcing or Australia-New Zealand, which can make it harder for suppliers to secure demand within their state.
Supply chain labels are another area that is complex, as most suppliers cannot trace their supply chain to the factory or source location with one hundred per cent certainty.
How can specifiers of these products know for sure?
Industry alliances, such as in the hemp industry, can enable manufacturers to work together to promote and refer business locally to each state.
The main barrier appears to be a lack of funding or access to start-up funding for biomaterial manufacturers. If government and private sector investment can better support these manufacturers, then these biomaterial products will be able to be made in larger quantities and remain competitive for consumers.