Authors:

Jeremy W Libby

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About Paper:

Polyethylene depolymerization is a process that could reduce plastic waste and allow for the monomers created to then be used both to produce new polyethylene but also for other industrial applications. However, polyethylene molecules are very large and have various branching features that make the modeling of the reaction kinetics very difficult and would have secondary reactions that might interfere with determination of the kinetics of the hydrogenolysis reaction. Therefore, the project is based around hydrogenolysis of simple alkanes with similar features to those of interest in polyethylene, such as branching or multiple close together branches, to understand the mechanism that the reaction follows. The kinetics will be determined using low conversion of ethane, propane, and isobutane on a 1 wt.% ruthenium on silica catalyst, and the products will be separated using gas chromatography to determine rates with hydrogen and alkane pressure, as well as reaction temperature. This study will compare results with other studies on iridium and provide recommendations for future experiments with more complex molecules that better model polyethylene, such as longer straight chain alkanes and longer branching alkanes with denser branches. In addition, this research hopes to inform future research about liquid state reactions that would be used in industrial depolymerization as opposed to the gas phase reactions used in modeling. Keywords: [no keywords provided]

Source:

Purdue University / 2025

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Co-authors:

Jeremy W Libby