Scientists turn plastic bottles and bags into liquid fuel

Using a two-catalyst process, a joint U.S.-China team of researchers has figured out how to take discarded plastic products, from grocery bags to plastic bottles, and turn them into useful products like fuel.
The process, described in the journal Science Advances, requires less energy and creates a purer end product than other methods -- and could offer an efficient new method for turning our plastic trash into treasure.
Plastics, which are essentially extremely long chains of mainly carbon and hydrogen atoms, are made from fossil fuels. The problem is, unless they’re specially designed bio-plastics, they don’t typically degrade quickly into biologically compatible products.
So scientists have been trying to find ways to efficiently convert these plastics back into fuels or other useful molecules — but that’s not as easy as it sounds, mostly because polyethylene is remarkably inert and difficult to degrade without special treatment.
For this paper, the scientists wanted to develop a method that didn’t require a lot of heat or other energy sources and that ended up with a cleaner product. So they turned to catalysts, which have often been used to build polymers but not typically to break them down.

http://www.latimes.com/science/sciencenow/la-sci-sn-plastic-into-fuel-20160617-snap-story.html

 

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From the article:

Use of quite expensive rare metals doesn't seem like great overall economics, unless catalyst recovery can somehow be both highly efficient and economical to do. Instead of going raw ingredients -> plastics -> raw ingredients (mainly to be burnt as recycled fossil fuel - more CO2 into atmosphere), why not find better ways to directly recycle; i.e. plastic -> plastic? Next bright idea please.

 

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Is that some thing new ? garbage plastics are used as binders in fire plase wood when mixed wood chips some other are used in disposable wood plates. ete . ete
To degrade polyethylene you just need oxygen and sunshine and any plastic with a side chain is very susceptible to oxidizers

 

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I think it is a good idea if they use CO2(after burn the fuel) to produce these plastics again.

 

Again I think that the idea given by 'Q-reeus' is better. Because making fuel from these plastics is not so good but from plastic -> plastic, because if we use the fuel to drive a car then energy efficiency is 30-40%. So making fuel from plastics again and again is to wasting energy and not only the problem about more CO2 in atmosphere.

 

If it is possible to use this fuel as rocket fuel and those plastics are made(if) of CO2 and others then it can be use safely.And when rocket burns the fuel out of earth's atmosphere, that means reducing CO2 also(of earth's atmosphere). But lighter and energetic chemical rocket fuel is best.

 

Thats pretty neat!