Designer Marleen Kaptein in collaboration with the Netherlands aerospace centre (NLR), has created a chair made out of recycled carbon fibre.
First developed in 1960, carbon fibre is made by bonding carbon atoms together into long chains to create a material that is 4 to 5 times stronger than steel, extremely lightweight and thinner than a human hair. Mixing the carbon fibre with a plastic polymer resin and weaving it into sheets, the material is then used for various applications such as automobiles and aerospace.
The downside of carbon fibre is the difficulty of recycling the material due to its non-degradable properties. According to figures cited by Tim Rademacker, a managing director at CFK Valley Recycling, an estimated 30 percent of carbon fibre in 2014, roughly 22 million lbs (10,000 metric tonnes) worldwide, ended up as production waste during the manufacturing process.
Although possible to recycle carbon fibre by burning off, grinding, and or chemically dissolving the cured polymer, the carbon fibres are often damaged in the process.
Facilitating the collab between Kaptein and NLR is an initiative called LABEL/BREED, whose focus is “the development of sustainable and innovative interior objects by establishing collaborations between designers and manufacturers”.
Stating how the carbon fibre production wastes are typically dumped in landfills and buried under asphalt roads, LABEL/BREED has decided to “get creative with it instead”.
Utilizing a fibre placement machine used by NLR to manufacture the structural components in the aerospace industry, Kaptein has designed and printed a chair that is made with 96% carbon recycled from production waste and 4% carbon fibre tape.
Made to be durable and flexible, the recycled carbon fibre chair weighs just 4.6 lbs (2.1 kg).
To learn more about the recycled carbon chair, click the link below.
https://www.labelbreed.nl/collaborations/marleen-kaptein-nlr/recycled-carbon-chair/
