Optimizing Algae Based Polyurethanes for Controlled Biodegradation

Today approximately 360 million metric tons (MMt) of plastic waste is generated every year, and only a few percent of that ever gets recycled, with the vast majority accumulating in landfills, or worse in the natural environments like our oceans. If we continue at this same rate, there will be 96 billion tons of plastic waste accumulated on this planet by 2050. Our goal is to develop sustainable sourced and biodegradable polyurethanes derived from algae biomass. We have developed algae-based polyurethane foams for both athletic shoe midsoles and flip flop footbeds. Because we produce bio-based polyurethanes which have chemical bonds that occur in nature, the resulting polyurethanes should be biodegradable. In Phase I, we demonstrated that our foams do, in fact, biodegrade in both compost and soil. We also identified a consortium of organisms responsible for this degradation, and characterized the breakdown products of the foam as they degraded. For an optimal product lifecycle we need to make sure that the foams we produce do not degrade while in use, but then degrade quickly once the end of life of the product has been reached. In Phase II, we plan to develop “tunable” foams where we control the biodegradation rate of our products based on an understanding of the chemical, physical and biological processes of polyurethane degradation. For this we will need to correlate breakdown rates with the chemical structure of the foam, identify degrading organisms and the enzymes responsible for degradation, and produce formulations that degrade at a specific rate in a specific environment (e.g., rapidly, in oceans). If we can identify and understand these key components and processes, we can commercialize our technology to produce foams that meet specifications for the shoe, furniture, and sportswear industry, among others. Under this award we specifically propose to: 1) correlate PU foam degradation with chemical/physical properties and establish analytics for these processes.