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Polypropylene Contamination in Post-Consumer Polyolefin Waste: Characterisation, Consequences and Compatibilisation
Plastic recycling strikes a balance between functional, mass producible products and environmental sustainability and is pegged by governments for rapid expansion. However, ambitious targets on recycled material adoption across new markets are at odds with the often heterogenous properties of contam...
Autores principales: | , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
MDPI
2021
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8401875/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34451165 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/polym13162618 |
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author | Karaagac, Erdal Jones, Mitchell P. Koch, Thomas Archodoulaki, Vasiliki-Maria |
author_facet | Karaagac, Erdal Jones, Mitchell P. Koch, Thomas Archodoulaki, Vasiliki-Maria |
author_sort | Karaagac, Erdal |
collection | PubMed |
description | Plastic recycling strikes a balance between functional, mass producible products and environmental sustainability and is pegged by governments for rapid expansion. However, ambitious targets on recycled material adoption across new markets are at odds with the often heterogenous properties of contaminated regranulates. This study investigated polypropylene (PP) contamination in post-consumer low-density polyethylene (PE-LD) and mixed polyolefin (PO) regranulates. Calibration curves were constructed and PP content, its effect on mechanical properties and property recovery in compatibilised material assessed. FT-IR band ratios provided more reliable estimations of PP content than DSC melt enthalpy, which suffered considerable error for PP copolymers. PE-LD regranulates contained up to 7 wt.% PP contamination and were considerably more brittle than virgin PE-LD. Most mixed PO regranulates contained 45–95 wt.% PP and grew more brittle with increasing PP content. Compatibilisation with 5 wt.% ethylene-based olefin block copolymer resulted in PE-LD blends resembling virgin PE-LD and considerable improvements in the properties of mixed PO blends. These results illustrate the prevalence of PP in recycled PE, challenges associated with its quantification, effect on mechanical properties, and compatibilisation viability, thereby representing an important step towards higher quality regranulates to meet the recycling demands of tomorrow. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-8401875 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2021 |
publisher | MDPI |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-84018752021-08-29 Polypropylene Contamination in Post-Consumer Polyolefin Waste: Characterisation, Consequences and Compatibilisation Karaagac, Erdal Jones, Mitchell P. Koch, Thomas Archodoulaki, Vasiliki-Maria Polymers (Basel) Article Plastic recycling strikes a balance between functional, mass producible products and environmental sustainability and is pegged by governments for rapid expansion. However, ambitious targets on recycled material adoption across new markets are at odds with the often heterogenous properties of contaminated regranulates. This study investigated polypropylene (PP) contamination in post-consumer low-density polyethylene (PE-LD) and mixed polyolefin (PO) regranulates. Calibration curves were constructed and PP content, its effect on mechanical properties and property recovery in compatibilised material assessed. FT-IR band ratios provided more reliable estimations of PP content than DSC melt enthalpy, which suffered considerable error for PP copolymers. PE-LD regranulates contained up to 7 wt.% PP contamination and were considerably more brittle than virgin PE-LD. Most mixed PO regranulates contained 45–95 wt.% PP and grew more brittle with increasing PP content. Compatibilisation with 5 wt.% ethylene-based olefin block copolymer resulted in PE-LD blends resembling virgin PE-LD and considerable improvements in the properties of mixed PO blends. These results illustrate the prevalence of PP in recycled PE, challenges associated with its quantification, effect on mechanical properties, and compatibilisation viability, thereby representing an important step towards higher quality regranulates to meet the recycling demands of tomorrow. MDPI 2021-08-06 /pmc/articles/PMC8401875/ /pubmed/34451165 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/polym13162618 Text en © 2021 by the authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). |
spellingShingle | Article Karaagac, Erdal Jones, Mitchell P. Koch, Thomas Archodoulaki, Vasiliki-Maria Polypropylene Contamination in Post-Consumer Polyolefin Waste: Characterisation, Consequences and Compatibilisation |
title | Polypropylene Contamination in Post-Consumer Polyolefin Waste: Characterisation, Consequences and Compatibilisation |
title_full | Polypropylene Contamination in Post-Consumer Polyolefin Waste: Characterisation, Consequences and Compatibilisation |
title_fullStr | Polypropylene Contamination in Post-Consumer Polyolefin Waste: Characterisation, Consequences and Compatibilisation |
title_full_unstemmed | Polypropylene Contamination in Post-Consumer Polyolefin Waste: Characterisation, Consequences and Compatibilisation |
title_short | Polypropylene Contamination in Post-Consumer Polyolefin Waste: Characterisation, Consequences and Compatibilisation |
title_sort | polypropylene contamination in post-consumer polyolefin waste: characterisation, consequences and compatibilisation |
topic | Article |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8401875/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34451165 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/polym13162618 |
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