MATERIALS | BIOPLASTICS
until the polymer chains are short enough to become soluble in water. These soluble substances – oligomers and lactic acid monomers – will be biodegraded by micro-organisms into biomass, water, and carbon dioxide, said the study. “These findings confirm that, if PLA is leaked into
the environment, it will not have the long-term impact as a microplastic that we know occurs with non-biodegradable polymers,” said Erwin Vink, a board member of Holland Bioplastics. As well as Holland Bioplastics, the study was
supported by bioplastics producers Futerro, Total-Energies Corbion and NatureWorks. Christian Lott, managing director of Hydra Marine Sciences, added: “The study shows that PLA in the environment will not leave persistent pollution as long as humidity and water are present. However, it does not belong in the environment, so it is critical that we do not use these attributes to encourage littering or slow the development of global waste infrastructure.”
CLICK ON THE LINKS FOR MORE INFORMATION: �
www.nova-institute.eu �
www.chini.com �
www.natureworksllc.com �
www.plasticsindustry.org �
www.gaiabiomaterials.com �
www.cjbiomaterials.com �
www.ri.se/en/cellulose-foam �
www.iap.fraunhofer.de/en �
www.hollandbioplastics.nl �
www.hydramarinesciences.com �
www.futerro.com �
www.totalenergies-corbion.com
Aiming for all-plastics biodegradability
Spanish plastics technical institute Aimplas has been working on a European project to develop chemical and biotechnological pretreatments capable of converting synthetic plastics to biodegradable materials. The work is part of the BioICEP project (Bio Innovation of a Circular Economy for Plastics). Pretreatments being examined by Aimplas include microwave-assisted thermochemical degradation, which it says has yielded promising results by turning non-biodegradable plastic waste such as LDPE into easily biodegradable materials that totally degraded in less than 28 days. It has also studied depolymerisation of polyamides and use of reactive extrusion technologies to change the polymer structure to improve biodegradation. The final proposed solution involves three technologies that are said to enhance, acceler- ate or increase degradation of plastics beyond current levels. The first consists of chemical disintegration processes to reduce molecular weight, including a new microwave-based technology. The second involves biocatalytic digestion with improved enzymes while the third process employs optimised microbial strains. �
www.aimplas.net
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