In the wake of Canada’s 2003 bovine spongiform encephalopathy outbreak (that’s Mad Cow Disease to you and me), the Canadian government barred the use of BSE infected tissue – including the skull, brain, eyes and spinal cords of cattle – in the production of any and all byproducts.
Fearing that such tissue would merely end up in the landfills of North America, University of Alberta Department of Agricultural, Food and Nutritional Science associate professor David Bressler is looking to turn these waste materials into – among other things – bio-friendly plastic for the automotive industry.
“The plastic industry is under pressure to increase the renewable content in its products. As a result, this project offers the opportunity to do just that.”
Bressler, in conjunction with the Canada Food Inspection Agency and car parts maker the Woodbridge Group, is working on breaking down the proteins that cause BSE into smaller pieces and cross-linking them with other protein molecules to create a network or rigid structure.
He reckons the new heavy-duty plastics could be in use in the auto industry within the next six to twelve months, with other industries adopting them before then. Bressler explains: “The (auto) parts will have to go [through] a regulatory process of being tested and certified.”
And he’s not the only one looking into bio-plastics as an alternative to the traditional, petrochemical-based alternatives: industry, government and other researchers are also looking into recycling high-risk proteins into safe, sustainable products.
If it can be done and saves this material from going into the world’s landfills, I say: do it!
By Tristan Hankins
