Overcoming Barriers Towards the Catalytic Deconstruction and Upgrading of Plastic Waste

Single-use plastics such as polyolefins provide effective packaging and materials for food, medicine, and many other consumer products, which has led to massive global generation of plastic waste. This waste is accumulating in landfills and the environment, causing harm to the ecosystem and human health. While a small fraction of plastic waste is mechanically recycled, the material quality cannot yet compete with virgin polymers. Chemical recycling with heterogeneous catalysis offers an opportunity to reduce the energy required to selectively deconstruct polyolefins into higher value fuels, chemicals, and monomers. Hydrogenolysis and hydrocracking are emerging methods of lowering the energy required to break the strong bonds in polymers through the use of a catalyst and hydrogen gas; however, the scalability of these technologies is limited by the high cost of reactants, the requirement for high pressure molecular hydrogen or solvents, and the high cost of catalytic materials. This talk will start by discussing advances in the catalytic depolymerization of waste plastics with earth-abundant catalysts, followed by progress in hydrogen-free depolymerization pathways. The talk will close with a discussion on emerging frameworks for the chemical recycling of mixed plastic waste feedstocks and an outlook on remaining technical challenges as well as economic and environmental considerations in polymer upcycling, redesign, and circularity.

Dr. Julie E. Rorrer is an Assistant Professor of Chemical Engineering at the University of Washington, Seattle. Her research group focuses on using heterogeneous catalysis for the chemical recycling of waste plastics and the production of renewable fuels and chemicals.  She received her PhD in Chemical Engineering from UC Berkeley and her BS from Arizona State University. Prior to UW, she was a Beckman Postdoctoral fellow at MIT. Her recent awards include the ARPA-E IGNIITE Award, and the American Institute of Chemical Engineers 35 Under 35 Award. In addition to her work in catalysis, she is the founder of the ongoing educational initiative, ColorMePhD, which creates free coloring activities to explain current research in STEM to aspiring scientists and engineers.