every year 67 million tons of coconuts are harvested for natural sports drinks and food products; however, this also produces large amounts of agricultural waste. nci has embraced the opportunity to turn renewables into automotive parts in your vehicle and consumer goods sold at your local retailer!

by focusing on natural composites, nci facilitates finding natural, renewable alternatives to petroleum-based synthetic materials. with nci’s special processing, coconut shells can be ground into a fine powder and used as a functional filler in a multitude of plastic parts. above and beyond reducing petroleum content, the coconut material actually increases mechanical performance. that’s why we call our coconut shell powder a functional filler. it works great in thermoplastic and thermoset applications providing great dispersion and less wear and tear on machines.

additionally, production facilities in developing countries provide natural economic stimulus to workers by finding higher value-added applications for bio-waste streams. nci is committed to dignity of workers, improving safety and opportunity.

most conversations about bio-materials begin with research alone without a plausible business case, with unclear material benefits, and without a functional supply chain. nci’s coconut products provide equivalent or better cost solutions that increase material properties and can be sourced for quality, traceability and scale. perhaps most exciting, coconuts are only the beginning; natural waste streams exist around the globe, and nci looks forward to finding solutions that incorporate renewables into products used every day!

researchers at texas a&m, missouri university of science and technology and the university of toronto have collaborated on another project that is also focused on learning from nature. the team is exploring how to capture the function of a natural system and use this to generate new design ideas. they have discovered that natural systems may be modeled functionally as if they were engineered systems. researchers can therefore design engineered systems by adapting solutions from natural systems. for example, they have studied the maneuverability of a housefly and captured the function and energy use of its wings, which can then be applied to improving the design of a micro-vehicle with flapping wings. however, in applying biologically-based design, it is critical to understand energy sources and flows.

by looking to nature for inspiration, engineers and designers can draw upon a multitude of design elements to solve design problems. both teams are discovering the underlying principles behind designs in nature and applying them to engineered designs with the goal of creating more environmentally friendly and energy efficient systems.