Balticfloc is looking for safer flame retardants in insulation materials

Balticfloc Ltd., is a Latvian partner company in LIFE FFR-2 producing ecological insulation materials from wastepaper, recycled cellulose fibres and textile fibres. The company’s main products are insulation materials such as ecowool, hemp and textile fiber.

Ecowool is produced from natural cellulose fibre, while processing wastepaper. To ensure its fire safety of, additives with flame retardant and fungicidal properties need to be added to the ready product. In the frame of the project, the company aims to identify safer alternatives to currently used flame retardants, test them in the ready product and introduce them in the production.

What the company has already done:

• Balticfloc has searched for technical and chemical solutions to completely replace boron-containing substances in their production processes. They identified a much safer alternative (a magnesium salt) and purchased test batches.
• As BalticFloc’s product is based on a very specific and sustainable base component , ready-made solutions for flame-retardation are not available, and the company needs to invest in finding exact technical solutions, i.e. how to apply the substitute substance and integrate it in the final product. Test-scale experiments with varying concentrations are being done currently.

BalticFloc is fully confident that the identified alternative will be implemented at full-scale production by the end of the project, providing customers with a product that does not contain any SVHCs, while maintaining the existing use properties. At the same time, this provides an opportunity to reduce chemical-based risks for the own employees who are involved in the raw product preparation and mixing processes.

Furthermore, the company is seeing phasing out SVHC substances before any legal restrictions apply to them as an advantage in the construction products market, giving them a way how to build a sustainable business pathway over the coming years.