Unmet Need
Plastics are found in numerous products throughout almost any setting, most notably as part of food service items, disposable products, and container and packaged products. The American Chemistry Council has calculated that 35.4 million tons of plastic municipal solid waste (MSW) were generated in the U.S. alone in 2017. This number accounted for 13.2% of total MSW generation worldwide. The EPA states that the overall rate of plastic recycling in 2017 was just 8.4%. There is, thus, a large need to improve the recycling processes for plastics and for greater attention toward their end-of-life management. Chemical recycling is becoming a popular landfill alternative, and provides benefits over incineration, which emits toxic compounds. Current chemical recycling methods are inefficient with respect to energy usage (requiring high temperatures and/or pressures) and do not generate consistent products from the reactions.
Technology Overview
Johns Hopkins researchers have developed a process for upcycling plastics waste that employs a more active, selective, and stable Zeolite catalyst. The upcycling process with this Zeolite catalyst generates valuable products from the chemical recycling process, such as benzene, toluene and xylene (BTX).
Stage of Development
The researchers have fully developed and tested the catalyst.
Publications
N/A
