Novel catalysts with little ruthenium may help turn plastic waste into new materials and fuels
Researchers at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory discovered a promising approach to make it easier to turn petroleum-based plastic waste into chemicals that can be used to produce new materials and fuels.Their method, which could make it possible to “up-cycle” plastics into more valuable products, focuses on increasing the efficiency of the desired chemical conversion.
In their experiments, the scientists determined how to efficiently break chemical bonds within plastics and facilitate a reaction that allows hydrogen to be added, resulting in a hydrocarbon that can be used as a fuel.While the idea of exploiting this reaction is not new, the high temperatures and expensive catalysts needed to produce fuels this way have made it cost-prohibitive for practical use.
According to the group, polypropylene and another type of plastic, polyethylene, make up more than 50% of plastics produced—and this approach could work for up-cycling of both.They noted that the reaction that occurs when hydrogen is added to plastics often generates large amounts of methane, which is a greenhouse gas.
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