Production of high-performance biodegradable polyurethane products made from algae precursors

Summary

This final technical report details the development of high-performance, biodegradable polyurethanes (TPUs) from algae precursors. The project, supported from January 2021 to August 2024, successfully produced over 0.5 kg of algae-based heptamethylene diisocyanate (7HDI) and formulated TPUs with 100% bio-content and up to 73% algae carbon content. These TPUs demonstrated home compostability, with over 90% decomposition within 90 days, and exhibited excellent mechanical properties, such as up to 62 MPa tensile strength and 934% elongation at break. Scale-up efforts achieved an 11 grams/hour production rate for 7HDI and generated 700g and 300g of algae-based polyols. Techno-Economic and Life-Cycle Analyses revealed that current lab-scale processes result in higher GWP (e.g., 98.2 kg CO₂eq/kg for diisocyanate) and economic costs ($131.4/kg for diisocyanate) compared to commercial benchmarks, indicating areas for future optimization.

Key Facts

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