Waste to treasure: Upcycling waste express packing to sustainable packaging materials

Abstract

Waste express packaging, composed of plastic or cellulose materials, has attracted increasing research attention due to the rapid development of the logistics industry, which remains a challenge in hazardous solid waste management. Herein, the concept of “turning waste to treasure” is proposed based on resource utilization of waste plastic packaging and cellulose packaging materials to refabricate the hybrid membrane material for food packaging application. To do this, the polyethylene terephthalate/cellulose@Mg-Al layered double hydroxide (PET/cellulose@LDH) membrane was fabricated by in-situ growth LDH nanosheets on the surface of cellulose, followed by hydrophobic modification, and then electrospinning PET fiber. The obtained PET/cellulose@LDH membrane shows an high hydrophobic properties with a static water contact angle of 130°, which makes it less susceptible to contaminant adhesion during application. In outdoor test, it is demonstrated that the PET/cellulose@LDH membrane can be as large as 5 ℃ cooler than commercial food packaging. More importantly, the PET/cellulose@LDH membrane also exhibits excellent breathability and mechanical properties improving its practicability in the food packaging field. Therefore, the waste-to-resource strategy for resource utilization of waste express packaging can not only reduce the environmental pollution, but also develop an inexpensive and efficient packaging material with potential applications in the food packaging field.