DailyDirt: Biodegradable Materials Are Good For... Cars?
from the urls-we-dig-up dept
Lots of folks are working on projects to make car parts out of biodegradable materials. Growing car parts sounds like a cool idea, but there are still some bugs to be worked out (sometimes literally). Here are just a few examples of green materials that might make it into cars someday.- Latex from dandelions can be used as a plastics modifier for various car parts such as floor mats, cup holders and interior trim pieces. That's nice, and dandelions can make a nice salad, as well... [url]
- Biodegradable car parts could be made with natural fiber composite materials. But will the cars biodegrade before or after 10 years or 100,000 miles? [url]
- Adding soy oil to rubber sounds like a good idea -- until little woodland creatures start chewing on your electrical wiring. Rabbits have been known to eat through that new-car wiring... [url]
- Getting the keratin from feathers into plastics could help turn a waste product into useful materials that aren't made from petroleum. But all the 3 billion pounds of leftover chicken feathers won't even put that much of a dent in petroleum-based plastics production. [url]
- To discover more interesting car-related content, check out what's driving around StumbleUpon. [url]
![Hide This Hide this](https://ii.techdirt.com/s/t/i/topclose.png)
Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.
While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.
–The Techdirt Team
Filed Under: biodegradable, cars, plastic
Reader Comments
Subscribe: RSS
View by: Time | Thread
dandelions
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Hopefully it will improve the flavor as well.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Dandelion car
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: dandelions
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Bad Idea
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GAZ-21
It is all-most impossible to get good preserved white/yellow steering wheel or any other white plastic part for this car.
So I am not happy at all.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
why the /sarc about tech ?
Rubber degrades very quickly (rubber comes from trees remember), and steal degrades (rusts).
you also do not need petrolium products to make plastics and nylone, you just need carbon, its just the cheapest source of carbon is from oil.
Lots of things produce carbon apart from oil, as you said feathers, trees, grass.
the only reason things are created that do not biodegrade is because it's cheaper to make.
so what you buy a car now do you worry that your tyres are going to 'biodegrade" before 100,000mls ?
All you have to do is make the manufacturer of the product (in this case the car) responsible for any product that they produce for the life of that product.
So all the parts that are not biodegradable, have to be sent back to the manufacturer, and they are not allowed to 'throw away' those item, but they HAVE to recycle it.
And alot of companies are doing just that these days.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Genius!
http://www.wacktrap.com/travel/air-travel/under-hood-winked-denver-airport-parking-rabbits -eat-car-wiring
[ link to this | view in thread ]