California legal mandate to recycle plastic ignored: Energy and Fuels

[NNadir]

The article is from the scientific journal Energy and Fuels.

"Background. In the United States, plastics is the
largest growing waste stream, rising from <5 wt % of
total municipal solid waste (MSW) in 1980 to >11 wt
% today. In 2001, of 25 million tons of waste plastic,
only 1 million tons were recycled.1 In California and
elsewhere, waste plastic is a major issue, because of the
growing cost of land filling. Even plastic that is collected
and separated often gets sent to landfills, because of the
lack of a sufficient market.2 Although California state
law has set a recycle rate at 25%, the rate has actually
been declining in recent years, from 24.6% in 1995 to
only 17.9% in 1999.3

Of the waste plastic not recycled, 43% (or 11 MM
tons/yr) is polyethylene (Figure 1), with most of this in
containers and packaging.1...

...Considerable research has already been done on the
liquefaction of waste polymers and co-liquefaction of
waste polymers with coal, petroleum residua, and waste
oil.4-10 However, almost all of this work has involved
the conversion of plastic to transportation fuels, in most
cases using both high hydrogen pressure and a catalyst
to enhance conversion. Little has been reported on the
conversion of waste plastic to higher-valued products.
In this study, we investigate the conversion of waste
polymers such as polyethylene (PE) to high-quality
lubricant oils..."

An on line subscription is required to access the full article (from which this excerpt is reproduced), but the abstract is available here:

http://pubs.acs.org/cgi-bin/abstract.cgi/enfuem/asap/abs/ef049696y.html

The text is about a Fischer-Tropsch (FT) process to convert waste plastic to high value lubricating oils.

We have heard some praise here on the Energy and Environmental forum for Governor Gropenator, the hydrogen Hummer steroid boy, and his signing "million solar roofs" bill. Of course, if you've lived in California, you recognize that they try to mandate scientific and technical outcomes by legislative fiat with no regard to the practical issues involved. I suppose that the Gropenator's window dressing bill will be as Abraham Lincoln remarked in another context, "about as effective as the Pope's bull against the comet..."

[jpak]

1. Self delete

wrong thread!

:)