A global search for the next composite App-lication

Finalist List
The Composite App Challenge

December 10, 2010

The Composite App Challenge invited individuals and teams to submit applications and ideas in four categories intended to help resolve some of society’s pressing issues – infrastructure durability, fuel efficiency, renewable energy and protection from harm. The finalists for each category are:

Infrastructure durability

Applications

• Tony Carvalho, Brazil, Impermeable Composite for Solvent
• Tony Vanswijgenhoven (business), Covess, Belgium, Thermoplastic Hot Water Storage Tank
• Juergen Weigel (business), Brazil, Continuous Winding Technology
• Yuhe Yang (business), U.S., Composite Bridge

Ideas

• Leandro Henrique Grizzo (Student), Brazil, Reforçamento de Compostos de PVC com Fibras de Vidro Longas para Aplicações na Construção Civil
• Evgeniy Nikolaev (business), Galen Ltd., Russia, Composite High-Pressure Pipeline

Fuel efficiency

Applications

• Joe Carruthers (team), United Kingdom, Lightweight Crashworthy Train Cab
• Willem Louw (business), Lomold (Pty) Ltd, South Africa, Composite Pallet Box

Ideas

• Gauri Dutt Sharma, India, Lighter Container
• Philip Thicthener, Australia, Carbon and Glass in Filament Winding

Renewable energy

Applications

• Doug Selsam (business), U.S., Superturbine® Rotor Blades
• Claudio Mascialino (business), Bluebasic GmbH, Austria, Vertical Wind Generator

Ideas

• John Gangloff (Student), U.S., Fuel Cells
• Jaap Ketel, Netherlands, Solar Kettle
• Thomas Kloss, U.S., Commercial Ducted Savonius Rotor VAT WEC
• Philipp Schilcher (Student), Austria, Increasing Efficiency in Concentrated Solar Power

Protection from harm

Applications

• (No finalists in this category)

Ideas

• (No finalists in this category)

Application finalists are being invited to present their concepts to a panel of judges. Application and idea winners will be announced during the first week in February 2011.

Contact:
Kerry Desberg
Owens Corning
1-419-248-5939

Semi-Finalist List The Composite App Challenge

September 15, 2010

The Composite App Challenge invited individuals and teams to submit applications and ideas in four categories intended to help resolve some of society’s pressing issues – infrastructure durability, fuel efficiency, renewable energy and protection from harm. The competition is offering a $200,000 commercial development award for a composite application that can be introduced by the end of 2012, and a total of $50,000 for four composite application ideas for that effectively address marketplace needs, appear to be technically feasible and have a perceived market opportunity. One $20,000 award is for anyone and three $10,000 awards are reserved for students.

The semi-finalists for each category are:

Infrastructure durability

Applications

• Cavin Atkins, U.S., Armor Cladding
• Tony Carvalho, Brazil, Impermeable Composite for Solvent
• Sven Hansen (business), PolymerPark Materials GmbH, Germany, Lightweight Composite Scaffolding Walkway
• Ramamurthy Rallabandi, India, House Interiors
• Tony Vanswijgenhoven (business), Covess, Belgium, Thermoplastic Hot Water Storage Tank
• Juergen Weigel (business), Brazil, Continuous Winding Technology
• Juergen Weigel (business), Brazil, Pro-Vida the life-saver

Ideas

• Rani El-Hajjar, U.S., Ameliorating Notch Sensitivity of Composite Structures
• Leandro Henrique Grizzo (Student), Brazil, Reforçamento de Compostos de PVC com Fibras de Vidro Longas para Aplicações na Construção Civil
• Hiroshi Katsuma, Japan, Green Belt/Field with FRP Composite
• Evgeniy Nikolaev (business), Galen Ltd., Russia, Composite High-Pressure Pipeline
• Suhas Sisode, India, Use of FRP for Garbage Carrying Vehicle Body
• Raymond Yip Choy, Canada, Stronger Buildings

Fuel efficiency

Applications

• Joe Carruthers (team), United Kingdom, Lightweight Crashworthy Train Cab
• Luiz Augusto Indio da Costa, Brazil, Tex - The Motorcycle Bus
• Yoon-hyoung Lee (business), Daekyung-Fiber Co. Ltd., Korea, Low and Medium Turbulent Wind
• Willem Louw (business), Lomold (Pty) Ltd, South Africa, Composite Pallet Box
• Ted Stocke, U.S., Composite Homes
• Chris Tacklind (business), Twill Tech Inc, U.S., Two Wheel In-Line Vehicles
• Sergio Tempel (student), Brazil, Construir - Habitar – Pensar
• Yuhe Yang (business), U.S., Composite Bridge
• Aju Z (student), Laminated Paper Honeycomb Siding

Ideas

• Nishant Bhagwat, India, Railway Oil Tank Wagon
• Sameer Dixit (business), Tata Toyo Radiator Ltd., India; Structural Health Monitoring with Acoustic Emission of Composite Front Axle Beam for Truck Application
• Gauri Dutt Sharma, India, Lighter Container
• Hiroshi Katsuma, Japan, Ultra Light Weight Glass Insulation for Aircraft
• John Monroe (business), U.S., Solar Thermo-Siphoning Panels
• Philip Thicthener, Australia, Carbon and Glass in Filament Winding
• Aju Z (Student), India, Composite Cargo Container

Renewable energy

Applications

• Rekha Bangalore (business), Ix-Neox, U.S., New material for improving efficiency of PV and LED
• George Bullen (team), U.S., Smart Composite Wind Turbine Blades
• James Greeson, U.S., Composite Hybrid Wind Turbine Water Tower
• Sven Hansen (business), PolymerPark Materials GmbH, Germany, LFT Composite Reflector for CSP
• Doug Selsam (business), U.S., Superturbine® Rotor Blades
• Marco Antonio Souza, Brazil, Filament Winding Pultrusion
• Claudio Mascialino (business), Bluebasic GmbH, Austria, Vertical Wind Generator

Ideas

• Vikas Bawa, India, Mini Dams
• John Gangloff (Student), U.S., Fuel Cells
• Jaap Ketel, Netherlands, Solar Kettle
• Duk-gi Kim (business), Samwoo Enterprise Co. Ltd., Korea, Hybrid Vertical Wind Blade
• Thomas Kloss, U.S., Commercial Ducted Savonius Rotor VAT WEC
• Philipp Schilcher (Student), Austria, Increasing Efficiency in Concentrated Solar Power

Protection from harm

Applications

(No semi-finalists in this category)

Ideas

• Michael Griffiths (business), Accountable Safe Innovations P/L, Australia, Safe Systems Poles

Semi-finalists have been invited to provide additional information for a second round of review at the end of November. Finalists will be selected and invited to present their concepts to a panel of judges. Winners will be announced in February 2011.

Contact:

Kerry Desberg
Owens Corning
1-419-248-5939

Transforming the Infrastructure World With Impermeable Composite Pipe

Submitted by Tony Carvalho, Brazil

Need

• High-pressure composite pipe for ethanol, which is a solvent

Solution

• Composite pipe with an impermeable metallic liner
• Inner layer of graphite-filled polyester
• Double layer of tape-wound aluminum foil
• Structural plies of Advantex® roving

Benefits

• Ethanol will not be in contact with structural plies
• Lower overall cost with composites compared to steel

Potential

• More than 2,500 kilometers (1,553 miles) of high-pressure ethanol pipe needed in the next five years in Brazil alone

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Transforming the Infrastructure World With Composite Hot Water Tanks

Submitted by Tony Vanswijgenhoven, Covess N.V., Belgium

Need

• More and larger storage tanks for solar hot water, heat pump water, domestic boilers and industrial/specialty boilers

Solution

• Composite hot water storage tanks

Benefits

• Composite tanks resist corrosion
• Weigh less than tanks made with enameled steel, stainless steel and copper
• Leak under excessive pressure instead of bursting
• Cost competitive

Potential

• U.S. market ~ 9 million units annually
• EU market ~14 million units annually

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Transforming the Infrastructure World With Continuous Winding Technology

Submitted by Juergen Weigel, Weigel pro Technic & Economy, Brazil

Need

• Improved water and sewage pipe

Solution

• A machine divided into modules for on-site production of composite pipe

Benefits

• Space-saving production
• Material application carried out simultaneously along the length of the machine
• Choice of discontinuous or continuous production
• No long driveways for roving and no pipe de-molding
• No expensive transportation required

Potential

• Worldwide use in sanitation and water pipelines, and oil and gas supply

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Transforming the Infrastructure World With Composite Bridges

Submitted by Yuhe Yang, Parsons Brinckerhoff, Inc. and the University of Washington, U.S.

Need

• All-composite bridge to showcase the material in transportation infrastructure

Solution

• Optimized composite bridge design

Benefits

• Suitable for accelerated construction, reducing time and cost on labor, equipment rental and transportation
• Cost savings on substructure, maintenance and repair

Potential

• The experience will benefit potential future application on longer span vehicle bridges
• In the U.S., approximately 71,000 bridges are structurally deficient and another 80,000 are functionally obsolete¹

¹FHWA 2008

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Transforming the Fuel Efficiency World With Lightweight Train Cabs

Submitted by Joe Carruthers; team comprised of NewRail research center at Newcastle University, Bombardier Transportation and AP&M Lda, United Kingdom

Need

• Lightweight materials and structures for rail vehicles to improve energy efficiency

Solution

• An integrated composite train cab

Benefits

• Reduced part count (up to 60%) and reduced assembly cost with composites
• Lower weight (up to 40%) and lower operating cost (up to 20%)
• Less damage to track and lower CO2 emissions

Potential

• The annual global train cab market is USD 390 million

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Transforming the Fuel Efficiency World With Composite Pallet Boxes

Submitted by Lomold (Pty) Ltd, South Africa

Need

• A pallet box that is light, strong and recyclable

Solution

• Lightweight collapsible composite pallet box

Benefits

• New standards in mechanical-performance-to-weight in a collapsible pallet box weighing less than 30 kg
• Ship 2% more product per pallet box load
• Up to four times more boxes per return trip
• Fully recyclable

Potential

• Global shipping container market estimated at USD 5 billion (15 mil units)
• Pallet boxes = ± 5-6 million units

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Transforming the Renewable Energy World With Superturbine® Rotor Blades

Submitted by Doug Selsam, Selsam Innovations, U.S.

Need

• Lower-cost wind energy systems that operate at lower wind speeds

Solution

• Several smaller composite Superturbine® rotor blades on one shaft with a single generator

Benefits

• More power with less material
• Lighter total blade weight for same swept area
• Higher RPM
• Gearbox eliminated
• Expansion of viable sites
• Lower cost of energy

Potential

• Superturbine® rotor blades can enlarge the usable economic range allowing wind energy to expand many times faster

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Transforming the Renewable Energy World With Vertical Wind Generators

Submitted by Claudio Mascialino, Bluebasic GmbH, Austria

Need

• Environmentally friendly power production that can be used for domestic and local applications

Solution

• Vertical axis wind turbines made with fully recyclable composite materials and using a smart in-line dual-rotor structure with optimized vane profile

Benefits

• High efficiency, including in low-speed wind, which is the most frequent operating condition in many areas
• Reasonable price
• Easy to install

Potential

• The small wind turbine market has great growth trends and expectations

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Transforming the Infrastructure World With Long-Fiber-Reinforced PVC

Submitted by Leandro Henrique Grizzo (Student), University of São Carlos, Brazil

Need

• Reinforced polyvinylchloride (PVC) for increased strength in low-cost products used in construction

Solution

• Long-glass-fiber PVC composite pellets (LF-PVC)

Benefits

• Provides impact resistance three times higher than rigid PVC
• Allows reduction of fiber loading in end-use products
• Competes with rigid PVC – with better performance

Potential

• PVC is the third-most-consumed thermoplastic globally
• Use of 39 million tons forecast for 2011
• 60% used in construction
• Growth of 10.5%  annually estimated for Brazil

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Transforming the Infrastructure World With High-Pressure Composite Pipelines

Submitted by Evgeniy Nikolaev, Galen Ltd., Russia

Need

• Economical pipeline to transport liquid natural gas (LNG) through Siberia

Solution

• Mobile composite pipeline technology for on-site production

Benefits

• Reduced transport costs
• Insulating properties reduce cost of protection covering
• An 800-meter pipeline needs one or two joints instead of 66 to 67 for steel

Potential

• LNG plant on the Yamal Peninsula planned for 2015-2016
• 6.8 to 8.0 trillion rubles will be spent for facilities, especially pipelines

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Transforming the Fuel Efficiency World With Composite Containers

Submitted by Gauri Dutt Sharma, New Delhi, India

Need

• Lighter containers for lower shipping costs

Solution

• Intermodal containers with composite panels

Benefits

• A container weight reduction of 12% could result in USD 4.6 billion savings from ocean-liner transportation
• Savings also possible during land journey

Potential

• Container trade accounts for 70% of total trade value
• In 2008, the global dry container TEU² fleet stood at 23.6 million; 3.45 million TEUs were added in 2008³

² Twenty-foot Equivalent Unit (TEU), a measurement of cargo based on a standard ocean shipment container, which is 20 feet in length
³ http://www.unctad.org/en/docs/rmt2009_en.pdf & http://www.worldshipping.org/pdf/Liner_Industry_Valuation_Study.pdf

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Transforming the Fuel Efficiency World With Carbon and Glass in Filament Winding

Submitted by Philip Thicthener, Australia

Need

• Less-expensive pipe and ductwork with antistatic properties

Solution

• Incorporate carbon nano tubes with glass fiber reinforcements for composite filament winding

Benefits

• Pipe and ventilation duct giving less than 1 Mega Ohm of resistance per meter
• Products that are lighter and stronger than what is available today

Potential

• Ventilation duct used for negative systems in coal mines and other underground operations
• Pipe used for methane drainage

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Transforming the Renewable Energy World With Composite Fuel Cells

Submitted by (Students) John J. Gangloff Jr. and Cedric A. Jacob, University of Delaware, USA

Need

• Fuel cells that weigh and cost less

Solution

• Integrated structural composite fuel cells

Benefits

• Composites allow integration of most components into the structure
• Sandwich assembly provides orders of magnitude of improved stiffness versus monocoque construction
• Lower weight provides higher specific power output
• Significantly reduced cost of manufacturing and assembly

Potential

• The market for fuel cells is thought to be large and essentially untapped

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Transforming the Renewable Energy World With Composite Solar Kettles

Submitted by Jaap Ketel, Netherlands

Need

• Reduce the cost of solar hot water heating systems and conserve interior space

Solution

• Integrated composite solar collector and hot water tank

Benefits

• Easy and quick to install
• No attic space required
• No pumps
• No bacteria growth
• Looks attractive on roofs
• Environmentally friendly
• Corrosion resistant composite materials
• Payback after six years

Potential

• Potential for Netherlands = € 50 million
• Potential for Northern Europe (2.5 M units) = € 2,500 million

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Transforming the Renewable Energy World With Ducted Savonius Rotors

Submitted by Thomas Kloss, U.S.

Need

• Wind turbines that outperform horizontal axis turbines

Solution

• Ducted Savonius-rotor vertical axis turbines made with composites

Benefits

• Less expensive to construct and maintain
• Work in wind speeds from 6 to 100 mph
• Vanes ducting wind improve performance up to 300%
• Easily deployed in rugged terrain and remote areas
• Soundless and no hazard to wildlife

Potential

• Smaller units for home markets
• Scalable to commercial towers

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Transforming the Renewable Energy World With Concentrated Solar Power

Submitted by Philipp Schilcher (Student), Austria

Need

• Lower-cost concentrated solar power

Solution

• Composite mirrors with a sun-tracking motion and receivers that transform focused sun rays into heat energy

Benefits

• Reduced sun tracker weight with composites will enable use of smaller, cheaper motors and a smaller base
• Composite receivers will trap a larger portion of the wavelength of sun light

Potential

• Solar thermal energy is experiencing a boom that will likely continue if the price falls as it has in the last decade

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Entrants do not grant Owens Corning any intellectual property rights with respect to Application Entries.
Entrants do grant to Owens Corning the intellectual property rights with respect to Idea Entries, which means that Owens Corning may take the idea and run with it, develop it and, hopefully, someday bring it to market.
Read details in Terms and Conditions/ Submission/ Monetary Award.