Braskem and WEAV3D® Win the Altair Enlighten 2024 Future of Lightweighting Award

Braskem and WEAV3D® Win the Altair Enlighten 2024 Future of Lightweighting Award

The WEAV3D, Clemson Composites Center & Braskem Partnership won for their Rebar for Plastics® Lattice Technology Rebar for Plastics® combines Braskem’s polypropylene sheets with WEAV3D’s lattice technology to provide new structural and automotive solutions requiring high-strength and lightweight materials

Braskem (B3: BRKM3, BRKM5, and BRKM6; NYSE: BAK; LATIBEX: XBRK) the largest polyolefins producer in the Americas, as well as a global market leader and pioneer producer of biopolymers on an industrial scale, and WEAV3D Inc., an advanced manufacturing and materials startup, today announced Braskem’s and WEAV3D Inc.’s thermoplastic composite lattice technology, in partnership with the Clemson Composites Center at Clemson University, were named first place winners of the 2024 Altair Enlighten Award’s Future of Lightweighting category. The award recognized the partnerships’ cost-effective lightweight solution to enhance the performance of PP for structural automotive applications.

Joel Carr, Technical Service and Development Engineering Team Leader, Braskem America, stated, “Braskem is honored to be recognized by Altair as the winner of the 2024 Future of Lightweighting category which recognizes new material technologies that have significant potential to transform and advance vehicle lightweighting. The partnership between WEAV3D, Clemson Composites Center, and Braskem combined to create a truly innovative material that provides for more sustainable lightweight solution to help reduce vehicle carbon emissions all while enhancing manufacturing process value through material cost savings. This is a win-win for our clients and the planet.”

The combination of WEAV3D composite lattice reinforcement with Braskem PP enables lighter and less expensive thermoplastic solutions than conventional organosheet, unlocking new opportunities for the cost-effective replacement of sheet metal structures with thermoplastics throughout the vehicle.

“We are incredibly grateful to Altair and CAR for selecting us for such a prestigious award,” says Christopher Oberste, President and Chief Engineer of WEAV3D Inc. “This award validates the technical development and commercialization progress we have achieved over the past several years and recognizes the importance of WEAV3D’s cost-effective lightweighting technology as part of the future of sustainable mobility. Using the right material in the right place keeps cost and waste low, while still delivering substantial weight savings and performance benefits to our automotive customers.”

The Altair Enlighten Award honors the greatest sustainability and lightweighting advancements that successfully reduce carbon footprint, mitigate water and energy consumption, and leverage material reuse and recycling efforts. The Enlighten Award showcases the latest and greatest technology innovations dedicated to sustainability and garners interest from industry, engineering, policymakers, educators, students, and the public alike. The Enlighten Award is presented annually in conjunction with the Center for Automotive Research (CAR) and was presented this year on August 6, 2024, at the CAR Management Briefing Seminars.

“We collaborated with WEAV3D and Braskem to develop an industry-first high-rate structural automotive prototype that showcases WEAV3D’s tunable woven composite technology and Braskem’s cost-effective PP resin, leveraging our extensive experience in stamp-forming thermoplastic composites from the US Department of Energy’s Ultra-Lightweight Door program, ” says Sai Aditya Pradeep, former Manufacturing Applications Engineer and Project Lead for Clemson.

Benefits of using WEAV3D’s Rebar for Plastics® and Braskem Polypropylene vs. conventional composite organosheet:

LIGHTWEIGHT – Reduces sheet blank weight by ~50% and final part weight by ~23%

COST EFFECTIVE – Reduces costs by ~50%

EFFICIENT – Increases sheet yield from 25% to 45% by weight, resulting in a 62% reduction in trim waste

Braskem will exhibit at the Society of Plastics Engineers (SPE) TPO Global Automotive Conference in Troy, Michigan from September 29 – October 2, 2024.