Deodorization of kraft lignin for thermoplastics – a new testbed

Kraft lignin has an undesirable small. This odour is limiting the use of lignin in many applications where smell cannot be accepted. There is therefore a demand for kraft lignin without any odour that can enable the use of lignin on new markets. One such market is the use of lignin as a raw material to produce plastics for indoor applications.

RISE has in a collaboration with the company Valmet developed a process for the reduction of odour in kraft lignin. Valmet owns a patent covering this process. This process has been developed in lab scale and verified in pilot scale. Now, a demonstration plant is under construction. This project is aiming for the commissioning of this demo plant, for optimising the operation and for the production of test quantities of odour reduced lignin for testing in downstream processes.

The odour reduced lignin will be tested in the production of biobased thermoplastics by Lignin Industries. These plastics will also be tested by The Wood Region as a raw material for 3D printers.