PCCL, Isovolta win Styrian Innovation Prize for vitrimer-based prepregs

The research institute Polymer Competence Center Leoben (PCCL, Leoben, Austria), in collaboration with global materials technology and composite materials supplier Isovolta (Wiener Neudorf, Austria), have been awarded the Styrian Innovation Prize 2026 in the category “Sustainability: R&D institutions.” This award recognizes their work to achieve economic and large-scale production of recyclable fiber-reinforced and polymer-based composite materials based on polymers and prepregs made with an epoxy equipped with dynamic covalent bonds — also referred to as a vitrimer.

Read more about vitrimers: “Reprocessable thermosets and thermoplastic epoxies”

The joint research and industry collaboration has succeeded for the first time in the economical production of recyclable fiber-reinforced vitrimer-based composite materials for the aviation industry. Thanks to the distinctive chemistry of vitrimers, this new generation of composites combine the properties of classic crosslinked thermosets (which cannot be repaired, reshaped or recycled due to their covalent network structure) with the processing properties of thermoplastics (ability to be remelted, reshaped, welded and more readily recycled).

These new composite materials are characterized by:

• High mechanical strength and fire resistance.
• Opportunity for maintenance and recycling of interior components.
• Increased service life thanks to increased repairability.
• More efficient production methods such as thermoforming semi-finished products.
• Energy savings from transport and handling at ambient conditions — i.e., no frozen storage required.
• Adjustable geometry for on-site assembly.

This material development is based on commercially available epoxy resins that are equipped with dynamic covalent bonds. Thermal activation of these groups induces a viscoelastic flow of the material without changing the average crosslink density. The temperature-dependent control of the physical properties is subsequently used for production, assembly, repair and/or recycling, including easy separation of the fibers from the polymer matrix for circular fiber-reinforced composites.

This development has been successfully transferred from the laboratory scale to industrial production and is being advanced toward commercialization in multiple markets.