Synthetic resins created to be environmentally friendly

Because current synthetic resins are widely used in construction the new product could provide a commercially viable and environmentally sound alternative.

’The industry is very conservative and they will not go for something that is much more expensive than what they already have just because it is green. People like green but the industry doesn’t buy green stuff, they buy cheap stuff,’ said Professor Gadi Rothenberg who along with Albert Alberts developed the new resin at the University of Amsterdam in the Netherlands.

Most plastic products for domestic or construction use consist of three-dimensional networks of cross-linked polymers.

Bakelite resin which is produced by reacting phenol with formaldehyde is used to bind wood fibres in pressed wood such as medium-density fibreboard (MDF) and formica.

Meanwhile, the resin of urea and formaldehyde is used for medium-density overlay (MDO), a combination of concrete and plywood, used in concrete moulds.

The discovery of the new resin was somewhat serendipitous: Rothenberg and Alberts were investigating biofuels when they inadvertently ended up with a polymerised resin that proved to have interesting properties.