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expectations could be met with natural materials. For instance, consumers may want to see shiny carbon fber, but can something be printed to look like carbon fber? "It's a more complex thing than just the performance. We're trying to understand diferent material characteristics to human perception," Kirwan says. "'What is a luxurious material? What are its characteristics and how can manufac- turers replace that with natural or recycled materials?'" THE ULTIMATE CLOSED LOOP Beyond matters of what can be grown, the environmental trump card can be found in the closed loop of using strictly waste products. Ford is partnering with aluminum suppliers to recycle post-industrial waste from the aluminum used in the 2015 Ford F-150 into new aluminum that can then be reused for new vehicles. The same can be said of the seat fabric supplier for the F-150, Unif ( unif.com ), which makes the REPREVE family of polyester and nylon fbers formed through recycled polyethylene terephthalate (PET) bottles. The seat fabric is now found in several Ford vehicles. Ford estimates fve-mil- lion plastic bottles, otherwise bound for landflls, will be reused to adorn the seats in the current generation F-150. Dearborn recently announced it's working with alternative polymers frm Novomer ( novomer.com ) to develop and test materials derived, in large part, from the Holy Grail of waste materials: CO 2 itself. Novomer has created moldable foam, which goes by the tradename "Converge," that harnesses carbon dioxide—as in the kind that carbonates soft drinks. Having shown promise in automotive testing, the company is now in talks with Tier 1 seating suppliers around its frst would-be automotive product. Novomer sees potential in both hard- and soft-touch materials including seat backs, side panels and consoles, as well as foor mats and seat cushions. By weight, the material is made of 57 percent propylene oxide and 43 percent CO 2 . By adding a proprietary catalyst and pressurizing the mixture, the reaction creates enough heat to create a polymer without any additional heat required. Stored in tanks, Converge has a shelf life of about a year. Once the supplier is ready to use it, an isocyanate is applied and the polymer may be fashioned into a mold. "If a company wants to substitute our polyols for the ones they're using today, they will require diferent catalysts," says Peter Shepard, Novomer's chief business ofcer. "The recipe is diferent because it behaves diferently than what is in use today, but doesn't add costs." Some 3.5 cubic pounds of CO 2 is produced for every pound of petroleum-based polymer, while Novomer's foam creates one-third of that greenhouse gas material, Shepard says. The low carbon content similarly means it is less fammable than conventional materials, a plus for seat manufacturers. www.ADandP.media AD&P; ∕ JULY 2016 SUSTAINABILITY 37