Biofibers and biocomposites from sabai grass: A unique renewable resource

•Natural Cellulose fibers were extracted from sabai grass, a renewable biomass.•Extracted fibers showed high antibacterial activity against common bacteria.•The fibers could be used in textiles, wound bandages and dressings.•Sabai grass as reinforcement for composites provided high thermal and noise insulation.•Sabai grass composites ideally suited for green building and automotive applications. Natural cellulose fibers were extracted from a fast growing perennial grass Eulaliopsis binata (commonly known as Sabai) and characterized for their structure and properties. The untreated sabai grass has been used as reinforcement for polypropylene composites and properties of the composites have been investigated. Although the composition of the sabai grass is typical to other lignocellulosic sources, there is a high content of flavonoids (630 mg/g) and phenols (510 mg/g) which provides high antibacterial, and antifungal properties to the fibers and composites developed. Fiber bundles extracted from the grass had tensile strength of 493 MPa and tensile modulus of 21 GPa, similar to common natural cellulose fibers. Both tensile and flexural properties of polypropylene composites increased with increasing ratio of sabai grass. Polypropylene composites reinforced with sabai grass show high noise insulation and thermal resistance properties suggesting their suitability for automotive and building applications.