Insights into upcycling of waste plastics by thermal depolymerization

Abstract

The goals of this research are to study the phenomenon of thermal depolymerization of plastics (particularly post devolatilization reactions), to develop new tools and techniques to facilitate such studies, to describe the process quantitatively, and to generate experimental data that will be useful to those who are constructing models of their own. The effect of high temperatures and increases in vapor residence time on the pyrolysis of polyolefin plastics was evaluated and comparisons were made to the literature. A chemical kinetic model was developed to describe the network of reactions. This study also investigated the partial oxidation of polyolefin plastics, a process little investigated in the literature compared to the pyrolysis of polyolefin plastics.