Sustainable materials for light-based 3D printing

renewable feedstocks, reprocessing, recycling

Even though impressive progress has been made in development of new manufacturing technologies as well as the search for new printable materials from renewable resources, a fully sustainable solution has not been accomplished yet. Most of the components employed for (light-based) 3D printing are derived from petrochemicals. In recent years, major efforts have been made in the development of formulations with high biobased content; e.g. from vegetable and algae oils. Meanwhile it is equally important to find new ways to create circular materials that can be recycled, to avoid contributing to the ever-growing waste problem. Thus, we search for new innovative approaches that rely not only on bio-based materials but also enable reprocessing and/or recycling of the resulting printed materials.