DITF and TECNARO receive award for innovative textile coating
As part of the eighth Bioeconomy Day at the Haus der Wirtschaft in Stuttgart, Peter Hauk MdL, Minister for Agriculture, Food and Consumer Protection Baden-Württemberg, presented five companies with the Baden-Württemberg Bioeconomy Innovation Award for their pioneering solutions.
The DITF, together with TECNARO GmbH, received the prize of 10,000 euros each for their research work “Textile coating made of lignin for sustainable geotextiles”. The project, which was carried out at the DITF by Cigdem Kaya and PD Dr. Thomas Stegmaier, is, like the other award-winning projects, a special success story that shows how bioeconomy can work in practice. At the same time, it is an example of successful cooperation between business and science as the key to success, said Hauk.
DITF scientist Cigdem Kaya accepted the award on behalf of all those involved at the DITF and at TECNARO and presented the development to the numerous guests at the event. Synthetic textiles are used in civil engineering, which could be replaced by environmentally friendly, biodegradable natural fibers. However, some of these natural fibers decompose too quickly.
In the award-winning project, Cigdem Kaya and Thomas Stegmaier, together with TECNARO GmbH, have therefore developed an environmentally friendly, bio-based protective coating made from lignin that significantly extends the life of natural fibers. A practical aspect of this is that lignin is produced in large quantities as a waste product during paper production. However, further research is needed to establish the existing waste material as a new recyclable material in industrial manufacturing processes in the textile industry. The award provides additional motivation for this.
