Back to the Future
It has been a long, long time since automobile dashboards were made from wood. You can still find them in antique car collections.
Today, the interior components of the car you drive are most likely made from Acrylonitrile Butadiene Styrene – or, ABS plastic – which is derived from petroleum.
However, your next car may very well have a dashboard made, in part, from wood.
The world’s leading maker of car interiors, Yanfeng Automotive Interiors (YFAI), was searching for new materials. In particular, YFAI was interested in making components with higher resistance to damage caused by sunlight, greater tensile strength, lower overall greenhouse gas emissions – and all at an affordable cost.
We were delighted that they found much promise in the highly renewable, organic polymers that Domtar extracts from sustainably harvested wood.
These polymers, known as lignin, are essentially the “glue” that surrounds the cell walls of plants like trees. These renewable polymers contain a vast amount of the world’s carbon and have the potential, when modified correctly, to replace many of the petrochemical-based products we use in everyday life.
It is just another example of Domtar making every day better with everyday products. And it could be coming soon to a showroom near you.
