Logo Green Fablab

Local plastic recycling for open source 3D printing can open new opportunities for a circular economy

The concept of Green FabLab is the intersection of several societal trends. From one side, there have been a growing interesting in the additive manufacturing technology (a.k.a 3D printing) technology. The creation of the fantastic RepRap Projet, an open source project, opened up many possibilities in terms of local manufacturing. Also, the impact of the human activity to the environment and natural resources scarcity is taking more and more place in the general conscious. Therefore, a central issue today is how preserve material resources to in terms of circular in order to preserve the as much as possible

Green FabLab

Green Fablab at Octroi Nancy Green Fablab at Octroi Nancy Green Fablab at Octroi Nancy
Green Fablab at Octroi Nancy
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Today, we are participating in the EU Project INEDIT, piloted by the ERPI Laboratory. INEDIT stand for the development of new forms of design using the Do-It-Together approach and conceive the furniture in the next short future. The University of Lorraine is seeking for making feasible the idea of printing objects from recycled plastics for the personalized furniture.

There is a great potential of Additive Manufacturing (AM) and manual injection moulding to contribute to a sustainable manufacturing. The integration of recycled material for the 3D printing technology and in the innovation spaces is a potential approach to contribute to the current sustainability issues in the world. AM will positively impact the societal development in the next decades to come. The development of sustainable principles, applications and practices play a key role in research activity in order to enable environmentally friendly, economically advantageous, and societal benefit-driven AM methodologies.

Energy, material consumption and environmental impacts are vital aspects that AM can better act to optimize in the manufacturing industrial context. On the basis of these concepts, some major goals have been outlined in order to fully incorporate sustainability principles in the AM processes.

Plastic recycling process of the sourrounding areas (street, neighborhood) could be carried out at small lot sizes minimizing, energy consumptions, and carbon emissions compared to the tradition centralized systems.

Our vision of Green Fablab (or Hackerspace, or Makespace) is that in these geographically distributed spaces, they can be considered not only as a fabrication spaces, but also a recycling, remanufacturing and refurbishing places in order to contribute to a more circular economy.


Our Publications

Towards a standard protocol for 3D printers

This paper deals with the development, manufacture and testing of a geometrical benchmarking model (GBM) in order to evaluate the geometrical accuracy performance of open source 3D printers.

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Recycling and additive manufacturing in an open source context

The coupling of open-source 3D printers and filament extruders can offer the bases of a new distributed polymer recycling paradigm

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Methodology for recycling in 3D printing

A general methodology to evaluate the recyclability of thermoplastics used as feedstock in open-source 3D printing machines is proposed.

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Logistical model for distributed recycling

A recycling model network to produce 3D recycled plastic filament and thus contribute to the Circular Economy.

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Closed-Loop supply chain for distributed recycling process

Distributed recycling can be thought of as a sort of “smart grid”, composed of small and coordinated recycling units using a Closed Loop Supply Chain (CLSC) network.

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Direct waste Printing

Fused granular fabrication is a promising technique driver to promote further greening of distributed recycling, elimination of the filament extruder system.

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Plastic recycling in additive manufacturing: A systematic literature review and opportunities for the circular economy

The rapid technical evolution of additive manufacturing (AM) enables a new path to a circular economy using distributed recycling and production.

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Our Partners

ERPI, ENSGSI, Octroi,

Upcoming Events

  • Conference ICE-IAMOT : 19th to 23st June 2022, in Nancy, France

Contact: Fabio Cruz (cruzsanc1@univ-lorraine.fr)