Korean researchers have developed the country's first oxy-fuel combustion-based process for creating synthesis gas, or syngas, from waste plastics, including hard-to-recycle thermoset plastics. 

A report posted to Newswise explained that plastics are generally categorized into two different types: thermoplastics and thermoset plastics. 

The former can be reshaped when heated, but the latter is purposely made to be heat-resistant and chemically stable, making them hard to recycle. 

These resilient qualities mean that thermoset plastics, which are often used in automotive and electronics applications, frequently end up in landfills or are incinerated at extremely high temperatures, contributing to environmental pollution, TechXplore reported.

"Once they are set in a given shape, they're in that shape for their lifetime," said Jeremiah Johnson, per the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Johnson is a professor of chemistry at MIT and has also studied thermoset plastics. 

"There is often no easy way to recycle them," he added.

The new oxy-fuel combustion-based gasification process, developed by Dr. Chong-pyo Cho and his research team at the Korea Institute of Energy Research, improves efficiency and reduces the common byproduct of tar by 93.4%. This figure meets the threshold for syngas used in chemical fuel synthesis, the report explained.

Syngas is a key raw material fuel for hydrogen production, which is a component of this multi-stage process. 

By using oxy-fuel combustion controls and a regenerative melting furnace that efficiently retains heat, the team has been able to maintain temperatures of around 2,372 degrees Fahrenheit, which are necessary to break down the tar waste that hinders the process. 

A pilot plant that uses this process has already been capable of processing one ton of thermoset waste plastic per day, according to the report. By using the resulting syngas, the system has shown that it can produce 0.13 kilograms of hydrogen for every kilogram of waste plastic.

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"This achievement is significant in that it greatly improves gasification efficiency and drastically reduces tar generation using entirely domestically developed technology," said Dr. Chong-pyo Cho, per Newswise. "We plan to scale up the process to a capacity of 2 tons per day and continue related research to move toward commercialization."

MIT's research into thermoset plastics found that by adding silyl ether monomers to liquid precursors that form certain types of the material, they could be recycled and reused without losing their resilient properties. 

With over 507 million tons of plastic generated each year, methods of recycling and reusing raw materials are essential to reducing the waste that pollutes ecosystems around the globe. 

Expanding plastic-free options in packaging and other products could also help mitigate the plastic pollution problem. 

Korea's Hyundai Motor Group introduced a similar waste-to-hydrogen method last year that uses organic waste and non-recyclable plastics to create biogas used in hydrogen production. 

These efforts all work toward reducing plastic waste, bolstering a circular economy, and creating an eco-friendly fuel that can be used to power next-gen vehicles, further reducing reliance on dirty fuels.

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