ERC Starting Grant · 2024
In-situ Mechano-catalysis for Polymer Activation and ConTrolled Conversion
Less than 9% of plastic is recycled. Currently applied recycling technology yields degraded materials because undesired mechano-chemical bond cleavage shortens the polymer upon repeated processing. Here, I introduce a new type of catalyst to exploit this undesired effect to recover the polymer building blocks, the monomers, which enables the production of new high-quality polymer. I will focus on polyolefins (PP, PE) that make up 50% of polymer production and for which the state-of-the-art pyrolysis process has high energy costs and does not yield pure monomer. That is because at the 600 °C needed to break the strong carbon-carbon (C-C) bonds of PP and PE unwanted reactions occur. Adding a…
From the public funding record at EU CORDIS. Describes the funded project, not the reviews below.