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In an effort to reduce plastic pollution, Chinese chemists have come up with an efficient way to break down polyethylene and transform it into liquid fuel.
These Chinese chemists recently participated in a study, where they combined an organometallic catalyst to a reaction to degrade polyethylene at temperatures as low as 150 degrees Celsius. While this method takes approximately four days to complete, it uses less energy than similar methods that used high temperatures to break down the polyethylene.
Tech Times has more on this study:
More than 8 million tons of plastic waste are dumped into the ocean per year. Plastic pollution poses a problem because the debris can survive for several hundred years. Plastic also gets into the food chain as birds and fishes ingest debris that float in the ocean and stack up in landfills.
While there are efforts that attempt to address plastic pollution such as switching plastic bags for biodegradable alternatives, mankind's reliance on plastic products call for more feasible solutions so human civilization would not drown in plastic wraps and soda bottles.
Chinese chemists appear to have come up with a potentially efficient way to address plastic pollution.
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