Brent Young

Correct, yes.

And packaging is a big thing, of course.

Yes, correct.

For example, fleeces, anything with synthetics, polyester, again, is a synthetic product.

It would be sourced from petroleum.

Yeah, I guess you're probably getting into the area of microplastics.

I guess that's the other aspect that, you know, why microplastics are prevalent globally.

It's been found in the depths of the ocean and actually at high altitudes.

So basically at micro scale, you're producing these microplastics, which can also have potentially harmful effects.

Hopefully both.

I think it's made the public more aware.

You know, it does take a crisis quite often to bring them into sharp relief.

But there have been a lot of people doing research and developing products that are alternative, say, bio-based products, so more natural-based products that can replace these products.

Scion, for example, now Bioresources Bioscience Group, have actually produced plastic alternatives that come from, you know, bio-based materials.

and have been doing a lot of research on that for several decades.

I've been involved recently with a PhD student who's been looking with industry, looking at sustainable carpets.

Even if you have a wool carpet, the backing and the adhesives may include petroleum products.

The challenge is getting a reliable biobased solution, often going back to the original materials like jute, which is a kind of a flax derivative for the adhesives looking thing, natural rubber derivatives of that, which are non-petroleum sourced.

So it's a challenge, but it's quite an exciting challenge if you're a scientist, because there's lots of work to be done.

So my focus is in energy, using digital models, which we often call digital twins, to help with decision making and optimisation of production processes and making them more efficient, emitting less energy, using bio-based alternatives.