The BioSupPack project has started a new phase with the aim of developing sustainable packaging solutions using polyhydroxyalkanoates (PHA) derived from beer production residues, while also demonstrating a feasible recycling process for these biobased plastics to ensure resources remain in circulation. The initiative, which brings together 17 partners from eight countries, has received funding from the Bio-Based Industries Joint Undertaking (BBI-JU) and Horizon 2020 framework.
Coordinated by AIMPLAS, the BioSupPack project has a budget of €8.8 million and aims to deliver novel, cost-competitive and versatile bio-based packaging solutions based on PHA for food, cosmetics, homecare and beverage products. The project’s main goal is to provide environmentally safe, superior and versatile rigid packaging solutions based on the new PHA family of biobased polymers, without causing any environmental damage during or after use.
The BioSupPack consortium will obtain PHAs from brewer’s spent grain and other monomers from enzymatic recycling of PHA packaging waste in several interlinked working groups. Based on these PHA compounds, several rigid packaging prototypes with tailored barrier properties will be designed at a pilot scale and tailored towards feasible waste collection and separation options. The packaging solutions will include injection-moulded PHA and biocomposites demonstrators as well as PHA-coated fibre-based service packaging and ready meal trays.
The project partners will develop an enzymatic recycling process for recovering PHA from these new packaging solutions while repulping the paperboard fraction. The prototypes will be assessed regarding their environmental and socio-economic sustainability and the safety of the new bio-based packaging.
The BioSupPack project is aligned with the European Union’s Bioeconomy Strategy and its Action Plan, which aims to accelerate the deployment of a sustainable EU bioeconomy to maximize its contribution towards the 2030 Agenda and its Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), as well as the Paris Agreement, and the EU policy priorities as Policy Strategy, as the Circular Economy Action Plan and the Communication on Accelerating Clean Energy Innovation. The project is supported by more than 25% private equity as a BBI-JU.
