Eco-Friendly Wood Composites: Design, Characterization and Applications.

The ongoing transition from a linear to a circular, low-carbon bioeconomy is crucial for reducing the consumption of global natural resources, minimizing waste generation, reducing carbon emissions, and creating more sustainable growth and jobs, the prerequisites necessary to achieve climate neutrality targets and stop biodiversity loss. The harmful formaldehyde released from wood composites can be reduced by adding formaldehyde scavengers to conventional adhesive systems, through the surface treatment of finished wood composites, or by using novel biobased wood adhesives as environmentally friendly alternatives to traditional thermosetting resins [[39], [41], [43]]. Another alternative to formaldehyde-based adhesives is the manufacture of binderless wood-based panels, since wood represents a natural polymeric material abundant in lignocellulosic constituents, such as cellulose, hemicelluloses, and lignin [[44], [46], [48], [50], [52]]. [Extracted from the article]