ReThinkWood

New FFG Talent Regional project: “ReThinkWood” – Innovative production and environmental technologies based on lignocellulose in the light of the circular economy

Project goals & contents:

As part of the recently approved ReThinkWood research project from the FFG’s Talente regional funding programme, topics related to the use of lignocellulosic residues and raw materials will be addressed: Over a period of two years, children and young people from a total of five schools (three primary schools and two secondary schools) in the Tulln area will work together with scientists and technicians to learn about the great potential of the wood components lignin and lignocellulose and the associated innovations, production technologies and products, as well as their importance for resource conservation. Our aim is to spark the pupils’ enthusiasm for RTI and make abstract concepts such as ‘bioeconomy’, ‘circular economy’ and ‘sustainability’ tangible for them, from the idea to its implementation.

The project focuses on personal experience of applied research, technology and innovation through age-appropriate and gender-sensitive workshop settings in schools, at the BOKU Institute for Wood Technology and Renewable Resources, and at corporate partners, where excursions to start-ups allow role models to be experienced in their working environment and concrete examples of innovative, lignocellulose -based production technologies can be experienced from idea to implementation.

The children and young people carry out exciting hands-on and minds-on activities on innovative products and production technologies with a focus on lignocellulose themselves and work together with educators, researchers and technicians to develop low-threshold experiments. This will integrate regional RTI topics and innovation with a focus on lignocellulose into school life in a sustainable manner and make them visible to the public (e.g. at the Lower Austria Research Festival 2024).

The project aims to appeal equally to children and young people regardless of their gender or social, cultural or geographical background, and to give them new impetus for training and career paths in the field of technology and applied research – the support of parents, who are specifically involved in this project, is particularly important here.