The REDONDO project has now been running for two years and the latest progress was discussed in the resent consortium meeting (M24) hosted by our CNRS partner at the Institut Charles Gerhardt (ICGM) at Montpellier, on the 25 of September 2024. In addition, on the 26/09/2024, Vincent Ladmiral and Sylvain Caillol’s team organised a highly engaging workshop on polyethylene, gathering over 60 participants both in person and online.
The consortium meeting was opened by Sylvain Caillol and Dimitrios Bikiaris, the coordinator of the project, and then the WP and Task leaders presented the work performed in the last 6 months of the project. Feedback on the review process was given in the context of WP1, the coordination and management work package. WP2 came to an end at M24, with the submission of the second deliverable, an update of the first submitted deliverable, which was presented to the consortium.
Then, ITENE took the floor, to describe their work on the safety aspects of the project (WP6), introducing the criteria according to which chemicals are rated regarding their safety and presenting initial hazard assessments on some key chemicals used in REDONDO.
Promising results were discussed within the context of WP3, with AUTH presenting initial results on the successful synthesis of reversibly cross-linked HDPE and CNRS on the functionalisation of PE with furan moieties and first cross-linking attempts.
The progress with composite materials were discussed in WP4&5. In WP4, CNANO and ITENE shared their latest results on the preparation and modification of nanolignin and nanocellulose respectively, while AUTH and AIMEN, for WP4 and WP5 respectively, presented their work on low- and high-density polyethylene/nanolignin composites. All these results will soon be available to the public through several scientific publications.
Next, in WP7, ISQ presented preliminary environmental impact assessments, conducted both on REDONDO’s products and on benchmark commercial products for comparison, along with the sustainability criteria and scoring system. AIMEN shared the work planned within Task 7.2 and the first data collected for the additives inventory. Finally, the initial steps for the development of the PLACE-me tool were discussed (Task 7.5).
Last but not least, in the context of WP8, RDC presented the updated analytics on REDONDO’s social media and the project’s dissemination activities (conferences and events) and AXIA their work on risk analysis of the various key exploitable results (KERs) of the project, initial patent mapping, suggesting potential patentability, and business canvases for the consortium’s private companies.
Overall, REDONDO is at a turning point of its journey: feedback from the EC and the reviewer was highly positive regarding the first 18 months, and despite a challenging start, exciting developments are expected in the upcoming semester!
Figure 1: REDONDO’s M24 Meeting attendees