Issue 02/2019

Materials
Advances
in the
development
of dandelion
rubber
T
he LFL Bavarian State Research Centre for Agriculture
(Freising, Germany), HOLMER Maschinenbau
(Schierling, Germany) and the tyre manufacturer
Continental Reifen Deutschland GmbH are jointly developing
a root harvester for the Russian dandelion. The German
Federal Ministry of Food and Agriculture (BMEL) supports
the work under the Renewable Resources Promotion Programme.
The Bavarian State Research Centre for Agriculture
contributes its experience in the field of root harvesting of
special crops, including horseradish, gentian and valerian,
to the project. The company Holmer Maschinenbau in turn
is one of the world’s leading manufacturers of sugar beet
harvesting technology. Continental Reifen Deutschland
GmbH, as part of the Tyres Division of Continental AG, has 24
production and development sites worldwide. The division is
one of the technology leaders in the field of tyre production
and offers a wide range of products for passenger cars,
commercial vehicles and two-wheelers.
Natural rubber is a very elastic biopolymer that, until
today, cannot be replaced in many applications. The
demand for natural rubber is increasing worldwide, while
the main supplier, the rubber tree Hevea brasiliensis, is only
growing in a narrow geographical belt around the equator.
Researchers and companies in various countries are
therefore looking for alternatives. In Germany, the Federal
Ministry of Food and Agriculture - BMEL has been funding
work on the Russian dandelion since 2011. The TAKOWIND
I and II projects were or are concerned with breeding
optimization, cultivation and the products rubber and latex
that can be extracted from the plant root. In the recently
started TAKOROD project, the focus is now on harvesting
technology, as cultivation trials have already shown that
conventional machines cannot optimally clear the roots of
this plant. The three partners hope to change this by the
end of the TAKOROD project in 2022.
This development is so important, as Continental
(Hanover Germany), technology company and manufacturer
of premium tyres, needs an efficient harvesting process for
the test cultures of the Taraxagum ® Lab Anklam, Germany.
This research laboratory was officially inaugurated and
presented it to the public in December of last year. After the
ground-breaking ceremony in November 2017, the building
covering an area of 30,000 m² is ready for occupation just one
year later and has therefore been completed on schedule.
It is set as base for future research on farming and the
extraction process of Russian dandelion as an alternative
raw material source to the rubber tree in the tropics. In case
of positive test results, the tyre manufacturer is planning
to introduce the raw material into serial production within
ten years, in order to obtain an increasing proportion of its
natural rubber demand from the dandelion plant.
At the opening, Nikolai Setzer, member of the Executive
Board of Continental AG and head of the Tyre division, said,
20 bioplastics MAGAZINE [02/19] Vol. 14