Eco-friendly materials for chemical products manufacturing: Adhesives derived from biomass and renewable resources

Fossil resources are the main alternative for producing synthetic polymers as foams, plastics, coatings, or adhesives. The limited availability of petroleum, the economic volatility associated to the prices of the petrochemical products and the fact that they are not recyclable, promote the investment in the research of new materials that contain high levels of biomass. In the specific case of adhesives, some compounds traditionally employed in their synthesis and manufacturing processes are now considered as toxic substances and present problems related to the health and the environment. Furthermore, petroleum-derived monomers present a limited production capacity that may cause the price instability of the final products. It must be noted that the use of renewable materials for adhesives production is not new. This is the case of wood adhesives, where casein or vegetable proteins were extensively employed prior to the development of synthetic adhesives. Further on, petroderived resins monopolized the market of adhesives owing to their price and functional versatility. Nowadays, new tendencies driven by academic and industrial groups push the research in new uses of biomass for "green" adhesives production that fulfill technical and economical characteristics equivalent to the corresponding ones of their petrochemical analogs.