EFRI E3P: Reincarnation of Polymers for the Circular Economy

EFRI E3P：聚合物在循环经济中的再生

• 批准号: 2029374
• 负责人: John Dorgan
• 金额: $ 200万
• 依托单位: Michigan State University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2020
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2020-10-01 至 2025-09-30
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2029374&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: EFRI; E3P; Reincarnation; Polymers; Circular

The United States recycles less than 10% of generated plastic waste. Low recycling rates create problems including: 1) leakage of waste plastic into the natural environment and accompanying fragmentation into microplastic particulate pollution that negatively affects ecosystems and human health, 2) depletion of our oil and natural gas supplies - the need to use lots of energy to make new plastics, and 3) increased greenhouse gas emissions compared to using recycled materials. The microplastics pollution problem is particularly concerning because these small plastic particles are entering the human food chain, and the effects of microplastic consumption of these very small plastic particles is currently unknown. Furthermore, several analyses have shown enhanced recycling will lead to dramatic job growth; upwards of a million jobs could be created. In this Emerging Frontiers in Research and Innovation project an interdisciplinary and diverse team will work to transform the plastics industries to eliminate end-of-life waste. Revolutionary approaches to sorting, cleaning, and transforming waste plastics enables a transformational outcome; present “end of life” thinking becomes holistic “end of cycle” thinking as more plastics are repeatedly used rather than thrown into a dump. The knowledge and technologies developed through this research will enable greater rates of plastics recycling, more recycling creates jobs while helping to protect the environment and human health. Investing in improved recycling technologies will help the USA remain competitive in the ever-changing global economy. Participation in programmatic activities is inclusive and fostered by novel cross-disciplinary interaction with Community Sustainability programs and through delivery of outreach programs for K-12 and undergraduate college students. A Diversity Team will work in partnership with the tribal colleges of Michigan, which are Minority-serving institutions, to support meaningful participation in STEM research by the Native American community. A deep and culturally diverse awareness of sustainability issues will be fostered through incorporation of traditional learnings into program pedagogy.The goal of the project is to develop and demonstrate new approaches to recycling plastics. The scope of the project includes novel ways to depolymerize polymers and repolymerize the products into valuable materials. Controlled experimentation complemented by chemical kinetic models, molecular-scale simulations, and machine learning are the primary methods used. Specialized expertise in life cycle analysis (LCA) will be used to assess and establish the utility of the new and innovative approaches. Chemical recycling through depolymerization is accomplished through cascading of chemically and biochemically catalyzed transformations. Consistent with a rapidly emerging innovation trend in the chemical sciences, synergistic combinations of chemically and enzymatically catalyzed transformations will be demonstrated through the case study of chemical oxidation followed by enzymatically catalyzed decarboxylation to create naptha (mixed alkanes). The resulting low-temperature cascaded approach will be compared to the present state-of-the-art of thermal pyrolysis; LCA will guide process improvements and be used to assess if this new cascading approach provides improved sustainability metrics. A direct comparison of a high-temperature pyrolysis process with a low-temperature cascading pathway can substantially advance knowledge in the plastic recycling field; to date, no such comprehensive evaluation is available. However, the implications regarding which of the two pathways deserves future emphasis are profound. The innovative use of combined reactor-separators will be demonstrated and is expected to be a superior approach to producing monomers from waste plastics. Repolymerization will be pursued as a means of “reincarnating” end-of-life plastic into brand new, high-value, specialty polymers for use in their next life. Oxidation of waste polyethylene will be used to produce dicarboxylic acids, and the innovative use of ammonolysis on waste polyethylene terephthalate will provide aromatic diamines. Resulting monomers are to be incorporated into newly formed polymers including polyesters, polyamides, polyaramids, polyesteramides, and polyesteraramids. These resulting polymers are considerably more expensive (2-3x) than the reclaimed waste plastic, providing an economic incentive that can effectively increase recycling rates.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

美国回收的塑料废物不足 10%。低回收率带来的问题包括：1) 废塑料泄漏到自然环境中，并随之碎裂成微塑料颗粒污染，对生态系统和人类健康产生负面影响；2) 石油和天然气供应枯竭——需要使用大量能源来制造新塑料；3) 与使用回收材料相比，温室气体排放量增加。微塑料污染问题尤其令人担忧，因为这些微小的塑料颗粒正在进入人类食物链，而消费这些非常小的塑料颗粒的微塑料的影响目前尚不清楚。此外，一些分析表明，加强回收将导致就业机会的大幅增长；可以创造超过一百万个就业岗位。在这个研究和创新的新兴前沿项目中，跨学科和多元化的团队将致力于改变塑料行业，以消除报废废物。废塑料分类、清洁和转化的革命性方法可以带来变革性的结果；随着越来越多的塑料被重复使用而不是扔进垃圾场，目前的“寿命终结”思维变成了整体的“循环终结”思维。通过这项研究开发的知识和技术将提高塑料回收率，更多的回收创造就业机会，同时有助于保护环境和人类健康。投资改进的回收技术将有助于美国在不断变化的全球经济中保持竞争力。项目活动的参与是包容性的，并通过与社区可持续发展项目的新颖的跨学科互动以及通过为 K-12 和本科生提供外展项目来促进。多元化团队将与为少数族裔服务的密歇根州部落学院合作，支持美洲原住民社区有意义地参与 STEM 研究。通过将传统学习纳入项目教学法，将培养对可持续发展问题的深刻和文化多样性认识。该项目的目标是开发和展示回收塑料的新方法。该项目的范围包括解聚聚合物并将产品重新聚合成有价值材料的新方法。主要使用的方法是受控实验，辅以化学动力学模型、分子尺度模拟和机器学习。将利用生命周期分析（LCA）方面的专业知识来评估和确定新的创新方法的效用。通过解聚进行的化学回收是通过化学和生化催化转化的级联来完成的。与化学科学中迅速兴起的创新趋势相一致，化学和酶催化转化的协同组合将通过化学氧化和酶催化脱羧产生石脑油（混合烷烃）的案例研究得到证明。由此产生的低温级联方法将与目前最先进的热解技术进行比较； LCA 将指导流程改进，并用于评估这种新的级联方法是否提供了改进的可持续性指标。高温热解过程与低温级联途径的直接比较可以大大提高塑料回收领域的知识；迄今为止，尚无此类综合评估。然而，这两条途径中哪一条值得未来重点关注的影响是深远的。将展示组合式反应器-分离器的创新使用，并有望成为从废塑料生产单体的优越方法。再聚合将被视为将报废塑料“转世”为全新的、高价值的特种聚合物以供下一次使用的一种手段。废聚乙烯氧化将用于生产二羧酸，创新利用废聚对苯二甲酸乙二醇酯氨解可提供芳香二胺。所得单体将被掺入新形成的聚合物中，包括聚酯、聚酰胺、聚芳酰胺、聚酯酰胺和聚酯芳酰胺。由此产生的聚合物比回收的废塑料贵得多（2-3倍），提供了有效提高回收率的经济激励。该奖项反映了 NSF 的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。