Analysis of products from the pyrolysis of plastics recovered from the commercial scale recycling of waste electrical and electronic equipment

Hall, William J.; Williams, Paul T.

doi:10.1016/j.jaap.2006.10.006

Cited by 104 publications

(50 citation statements)

References 24 publications

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“…Pyrolysis has been suggested to be a promising processing path for the treatment of WEEE plastics, but generates an oil with a high content of bromine, derived from the brominated flame retardants added to the plastic [4][5][6]. Zeolite catalysts have been used to reduce the amount of bromine in the product pyrolysis oil [6,7].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Catalytic pyrolysis of waste plastic from electrical and electronic equipment

Muhammad

Onwudili

Williams

2015

Journal of Analytical and Applied Pyrolysis

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106

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Plastic waste collected from waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE) was pyrolysed in the presence of zeolite catalysts to produce a gasoline range aromatic oil. The plastic was from equipment containing cathode ray tubes (CRTs) and also plastic waste from refrigeration equipment. In addition, for comparison the main plastics contained in the WEEE, in the form of high impact polystyrene (HIPS) and acrylonitrile-butadiene-styrene (ABS) were also pyrolysed in the presence of the zeolite catalysts. Two zeolite catalysts; Y zeolite and ZSM-5 were used. Catalytic pyrolysis took place in a two stage fixed bed, batch reactor with the plastic pyrolysed in the first stage and the evolved pyrolysis gases catalysed in the second stage reactor. The quantity of oil produced from uncatalysed pyrolysis of plastics from CRTs and refridgerators was more than 80 wt%. The gases consisted of hydrogen, methane and C 2 -C 4 hydrocarbons. When the zeolite catalysts were introduced there was a decrease of between 5-10 wt% in oil yield and a corresponding increase in gas yield.The composition of the oils derived from the uncatalysed pyrolysis of WEEE plastics were mainly aromatic with high concentrations of styrene, derived from the HIPS and ABS present in the plastic waste. Addition of the zeolite ZSM-5 and Y zeolite to the pyrolysis process resulted in significant concentrations of benzene, toluene and ethylbenzene in the product oil but reduced concentrations of styrene. The oils from both thermal and catalysed pyrolysis also contained significant concentrations of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons for example, naphthalene, phenanthrene and pyrene.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Catalytic pyrolysis of waste plastic from electrical and electronic equipment

Muhammad

Onwudili

Williams

2015

Journal of Analytical and Applied Pyrolysis

Self Cite

106

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

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“…Although a significant amount of research into the pyrolysis of PCBs has been reported, most of the work has been carried out under nitrogen atmosphere using analytical pyrolysis techniques or laboratory scale reactors involving measurement of kinetics [12][13][14][15] and characterization of its products obtained [16][17][18].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Pyrolysis of Printed Circuit Boards

Mankhand¹,

Singh²,

Gupta³

et al. 2013

IJMEE

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Printed Circuit Board (PCB) is an essential co mponent of almost all electrical and electron ic equip ments. The rapid growth of the use of such equipments has contributed enormously to the generation of large quantity of waste PCBs. The WPCBs not only contain valuable metals but also a large variety of hazardous materials. Conventional treat ments of such WPCBs have their o wn limitations. By pyrolysis of WPCBs, it is not only possible to obtain the organic part o f it as a fuel or useful chemical but can make further processing to recover metals much easier and efficient. In the present work, a kinetic study on the low temperature pyrolysis of WPCBs using a thermogravimet ric analyser has been attempted. The TG analysis was conducted in nitrogen and air at mospheres in the temperature range of 200-600℃ at a heating rate of 40℃ /min. The kinetic expressions for both the environments were determined and the activation energies were found to be 110.7 and 90.2 kJ/ mo l for n itrogen and air, respectively. The effect of thermal pre-t reatment on the subsequent copper leaching in nitric acid for untreated, pyrolysed and air-burned PCB was also studied. Copper recoveries fro m these samples were 30.4%, 92.5% and 96.2%, respectively indicating the importance of thermal pre-treat ment in leaching of the metal content.

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“…Analysis of BFRs and OPFRs in e-plastics has typically been performed using analytical techniques that involve physical sample preparation by grinding/chopping etc., solvent extraction and cleanup, and extract analysis with gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) [38][39][40][41][42] or liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry (LC-MS) [43][44][45][46][47]. More recently, the use of other methods including X-ray fluorescence (XRF) [48][49][50], Raman spectroscopy [50], Ion beam analysis (IBA) [51,52], and thermal analytical methods such as thermal desorption GC-MS have been proposed for FR analysis [39,[53][54][55].…”

Section: Analysis Of E-plasticsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Potential for Reuse of E-Plastics through Processing by Compression Molding

Mills¹,

Tatara²

2016

Challenges

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Abstract:The amounts of e-waste, consisting of metal (e-metals) and plastic (e-plastics) streams from electronic goods, are increasing in the United States and elsewhere. The e-metals waste streams are being recycled to a reasonable degree due to the value of precious metals. E-plastic waste streams currently are not recycled or reused to a significant extent. As a result, most e-plastics are disposed of by landfilling or thermal treatment, or sent overseas for alleged recycling or reuse, any of which could result in unsafe worker exposure and release into the environment. Two of the major barriers to e-plastics' reuse or recycling are the mixed plastic content and the presence in the e-plastics of flame retardants (FR), of which two classes in particular, the brominated flame retardants (BFR) and organo-phosphorus flame retardants (OPFR), have associated health concerns. The major goal of this project is to investigate the possibility of direct reuse of e-plastics in compression molding. Preliminary data generated have identified a molding procedure that yields remanufactured e-plastics having a tensile strength of 29.3 MPa. This moderate strength level is suspected to be due to inclusions of plastic bits that did not melt and internal voids from out-gassing. Handheld X-ray fluorescence (XRF) was utilized to characterize elemental components in the e-plastics tested for compression molding. Several high "hits" for Br were found that could not be predicted visually. The preliminary XRF data for BFR and OPFR in this work are helpful for environmental and occupational hazard assessments of compression molding activities. Additionally, methods are suggested to characterize the metals, BFR, and OPFR content of the e-plastics using several different additional laboratory analytical techniques to determine the suitability for cost-effective and easy-to-use technologies.

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Analysis of products from the pyrolysis of plastics recovered from the commercial scale recycling of waste electrical and electronic equipment

Cited by 104 publications

References 24 publications

Catalytic pyrolysis of waste plastic from electrical and electronic equipment

Catalytic pyrolysis of waste plastic from electrical and electronic equipment

Pyrolysis of Printed Circuit Boards

Potential for Reuse of E-Plastics through Processing by Compression Molding

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