04:38Researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, have created a new method to break down plastics into their basic building blocks, as part of the drive to reduce landfill waste and the use of fossil fuels, in footage recorded on Thursday.
Laboratory workers can be seen cutting up a plastic bottle, mixing strips with chemicals, and preparing the mixture for 'vaporisation'.
"The end product from our process is this three-carbon gas called propylene, and that can be used to make many things, but it can be [again] used to make polypropylene, the plastic," said chemistry professor John Hartwig.
It means waste plastic - like polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP) - can be reused for 'recycled' plastic products, significantly reducing the reliance on fossil fuels required to make new ones.
"If you think about where another plastic object would come from, right now, it would come from petroleum," Hartwig continued. "So [instead[ you'll get this material, the carbon would come from the recycling bin instead of coming back out of the earth."
However, it could take a while before the process is available commercially.
"I think it's easily a decade and I know that number doesn't sound good to people who consider the urgency of the plastics waste problem. And there may be more short-term solutions that do involve higher temperatures, more formations of carbon dioxide and methane that are greenhouse gases that are using more energy. Those may be the first solutions but then over time we hope to be able to replace them with something that is much more selective like the chemistry that we are talking about here," he added.
According to reports, around 80 percent of consumer plastics either goes to landfill, incinerators, or finds its way into the natural environment.
Gas-tic plastic! UC Berkeley creates novel method to 'vaporise' waste, reduce landfill
Researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, have created a new method to break down plastics into their basic building blocks, as part of the drive to reduce landfill waste and the use of fossil fuels, in footage recorded on Thursday.
Laboratory workers can be seen cutting up a plastic bottle, mixing strips with chemicals, and preparing the mixture for 'vaporisation'.
"The end product from our process is this three-carbon gas called propylene, and that can be used to make many things, but it can be [again] used to make polypropylene, the plastic," said chemistry professor John Hartwig.
It means waste plastic - like polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP) - can be reused for 'recycled' plastic products, significantly reducing the reliance on fossil fuels required to make new ones.
"If you think about where another plastic object would come from, right now, it would come from petroleum," Hartwig continued. "So [instead[ you'll get this material, the carbon would come from the recycling bin instead of coming back out of the earth."
However, it could take a while before the process is available commercially.
"I think it's easily a decade and I know that number doesn't sound good to people who consider the urgency of the plastics waste problem. And there may be more short-term solutions that do involve higher temperatures, more formations of carbon dioxide and methane that are greenhouse gases that are using more energy. Those may be the first solutions but then over time we hope to be able to replace them with something that is much more selective like the chemistry that we are talking about here," he added.
According to reports, around 80 percent of consumer plastics either goes to landfill, incinerators, or finds its way into the natural environment.
Researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, have created a new method to break down plastics into their basic building blocks, as part of the drive to reduce landfill waste and the use of fossil fuels, in footage recorded on Thursday.
Laboratory workers can be seen cutting up a plastic bottle, mixing strips with chemicals, and preparing the mixture for 'vaporisation'.
"The end product from our process is this three-carbon gas called propylene, and that can be used to make many things, but it can be [again] used to make polypropylene, the plastic," said chemistry professor John Hartwig.
It means waste plastic - like polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP) - can be reused for 'recycled' plastic products, significantly reducing the reliance on fossil fuels required to make new ones.
"If you think about where another plastic object would come from, right now, it would come from petroleum," Hartwig continued. "So [instead[ you'll get this material, the carbon would come from the recycling bin instead of coming back out of the earth."
However, it could take a while before the process is available commercially.
"I think it's easily a decade and I know that number doesn't sound good to people who consider the urgency of the plastics waste problem. And there may be more short-term solutions that do involve higher temperatures, more formations of carbon dioxide and methane that are greenhouse gases that are using more energy. Those may be the first solutions but then over time we hope to be able to replace them with something that is much more selective like the chemistry that we are talking about here," he added.
According to reports, around 80 percent of consumer plastics either goes to landfill, incinerators, or finds its way into the natural environment.