One Rijeka company has so far raised an impressive six million euro thanks to European Union funds and currently has eight European partners working alongside them on the new ”Effective” project.
As Darko Bicak/Poslovni Dnevnik writes on the 4th of December, 2018, the Rijeka company in question is Mi-Plast, it has played an active role in various EU research projects for the last several years, and has successfully withdrawn a total of six million euro from the Horizon 2020 program, as well as from numerous other research platforms.
The company deals with platic, and these roles have been mainly in regard to bioplastic development projects which are being conducted with large players from Europe, for which the EU has provided an enormous 80 million euro, while the Rijeka company accounts for about 7 percent of the amount.
Despite success, the Rijeka company didn’t intend to simply stop there, and Bio-Mi was then established, which specialises exclusively in biopolymers and bioplastics, since Mi-Plast has positioned itself on the market of standard plastics and is planning, at the end of the project, to bring yet more innovative products with more value to the market.
As was explained by Filip Miketa, the founder and director of Bio-Mi, they are currently working on the Effective project, which, in the coming years, could result in the first quantities of bioplastics and packaging coming from Rijeka.
“This project is one of the industry’s most comprehensive initiatives, it aims at redesigning the entire product value chain and ultimately stimulating economic growth. The project consortium comprises eight countries and consists of renewable raw materials producers, leaders in raw material processing technologies, semi-finished and finished product manufacturers, AquafilSLO and Circular Change (Slovenia), Aquafil, Carvico, Life Cycle Engineering and Novamont (Italy), Südzucker and Vaude (Germany), Balsan (France), H & M Group, Bio-Mi and CIRCE (Spain),” stated Miketa.
He added that one of the key goals is the effective development of sustainable bionylon, made entirely from biological components using renewable raw materials. The validation of the obtained nylon is planned alongside partners such as H&M, Carvico, Vaude and Balsan. The bionylon will also be used for textiles and carpets. The Rijeka company will also see that biopolyesters are developed for the packaging of various industrial products.
The recycling of this nylon will help achieve the goals of the circular economy as well as create an alternative in the industry. The project is being cofinanced by H2020 in the amount of 7.1 million euro.
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Click here for the original article by Darko Bicak for Poslovni Dnevnik
