Aircraft End of Life and recycling activities · Aircraft End of Life and recycling activities Torsten Müller, Fraunhofer Paris Le Bourget 20 June 2013 This document is the property

Aircraft End of Life and recycling activities

Torsten Müller, Fraunhofer

Paris Le Bourget 20 June 2013

This document is the property of one or more Parties to the Clean Sky Eco-Design ITD consortium and shall not be distributed or reproduced without

their formal approval

Initial situation • Current dismantling and recycling focus on

recovery of valuable materials (mainly metals) and reusable parts (e.g. landing gears, avionics)

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• No sufficient technology available for treatment of fibrous and polymeric materials; especially composites of both.

• Today incineration and disposal are treatment of choice, due to insufficient identification and recycling technologies.

Initial situation

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• Improvement of identification and mapping of materials and parts

• Development and optimization of CFRP treatment technologies – Reuse of production residue

– Fiber recovery by pulsed power fragmentation

– Fiber recovery by microwave pyrolysis

– Reuse of yarned recycling fibers in woven textiles

• Recycling of glass wool from insulation material as reinforcement in polymers and concrete

• Optimized dismantling and metal separation

Steps taken in CleanSky ED

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• Current total market share of carbon fibers used in commercial aircrafts: 10%

• Development: – A 310 (1980) and B 767 (1983): 5wt% of GFRP

– A 380 (2009): 25wt% of CFRP

– B 787 (2011) and A 350 XWB (2013): 50wt% of CFRP

– …..

• How to treat CFRP waste?

• How to regain high quality carbon fibers?

Growing carbon fibre demand

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Voltage: 70 – 500 kV

Current: 10 – 20 kA

Impulse energy: 10 – 100 Joule / cm

Power: 100 MW – 1,5 GW

Discharge time: 150 – 400 nsec

Pulsed Power Fragmentation

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The electric discharge preferably goes along phase boundaries in the solid.

The resulting plasma channel with temperatures of ~ 104 K generates a first pressure wave (tensile stress) with up to 1010 Pa.

The expansion of the plasma channel leads to secondary shock waves which intensify the disintegration of the solids / composites.

Pulsed Power Fragmentation

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Pulsed power fragmentation

Old concrete before fragmentation

After fragmentation: reinforcement, aggregates, calcite from process water and a fine fraction < 2mm

calcite

fine fraction aggregates

reinforcement

Application to concrete:

Pulsed Power Fragmentation

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Feasibility test to process CFRPs with

high voltage pulses in batch mode

Test specimen with carbon fibres before and after pulsed power fragmentation

Pulsed Power Fragmentation

Application to CFRPs:

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Polymer residue

SEM-picture: Carbon fibres released from a RTM6 resin matrix by pulsed power fragmentation.

Pulsed Power Fragmentation

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• Voltage and number of pulses depend on the type of composite (thermoplastic or thermoset)

• Current results produced with lab size batch equipment

• Continuous process is planned (running CfP)

• More information at Fraunhofer booth (Hall 1, booth G 316)

Pulsed Power Fragmentation

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• More economic dismantling strategies needed

• International network solution for high quality recycling of materials is needed, especially for materials with lower proportion by weight.

• Implementation of Design for Recycling strategies in the aviation sector

Future steps

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Thank You!

Any questions?

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