The Welsh government is backing a cutting-edge science project at Swansea University that changes waste plastics into highly valuable compounds for the energy industries. Deputy Minister for Housing and Local Government, Hannah Blythyn, will invest in a plastics upscaling project which has the potential to create highly-skilled jobs in Wales. Scientist are extracting carbon atoms found in waste plastics and turning them into a nanotube format that can be used for the transmission of electricity.
Dr Orbaek White’s vision is to advance global energy sustainability by producing long range electricity transmission materials from waste plastics. Dr Orbaek White, whose first scientific publication elaborated on the conversion of black plastic material that he purchased in a local supermarket, said: “Converting plastics into useful materials such as carbon nanotubes can be done with a large variety of plastics.
A major challenge facing recovery of plastics is that they often have to be downcycled; this new work promising a route to upcycling waste materials into value-added, advanced electronics. This is the dream of the circular economy, and the research proposed should help get us there. Carbon based nano materials are used in a variety of applications across the globe, but they are often sourced from fossil fuels. It is exciting to think that they may one day be sourced from waste plastics, giving those renewed life as advanced materials.” The £270,000 grant will be provided from the Welsh Government’s Circular Economy Fund.
Source: Eurek Alert!
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