An increase in the use of biomass to replace petroleum-based materials is mandatory in order to move to a more sustainable society. Amongst others, carbon fiber precursors from cellulose and lignin have large potential as alternative to Poly(acrylonitrile)(PAN) based fibers. 

In this study, continuous cellulose-lignin mixed-polymer filaments with various lignin content (0-70 wt%) are produced vis a dry-jet wet spinning method. Using continuous carbonization line, an industrially scalable tailored carbonization protocol is developed by adjusting the heating rate, temperature profiles, retention times and tension to the biobased substrate. The effect of the lignin contents on the properties of the precursor and carbon fibers is investigated. This includes morphology, carbon contents, carbon yield and mechanical properties as functions of the various carbonization protocols. 

The intention of this work is to gauge the possibility of the large-scale production of biomass-based carbon fibers for various applications.