Boosting Degradation of Polyethylene at Room Temperature

Abstract

Utilization of polyethylene (PE) has caused serious white pollution. Degradation of PE-based wastes has been a great concern. The traditional pyrolysis strategy for degrading PE-based wastes has problems, including operation temperature being higher than 200 °C and products being complex mixtures. Herein, PE is first degraded into CO₂ and H₂ at room temperature lower than 33 °C via a room-temperature discharge-driven degradation (RT-DD) process, with a degradation rate as high as 7.6 kg h^–1 m^–2. Then, the CO₂ and H₂ formed from the RT-DD process are converted into CO on a molybdenum carbide-based catalyst at 450 °C, with a CO selectivity of 100%. The RT-DD process effectively breaks and thoroughly oxidizes PE chains through the generation of high-energy electrons, oxygen radicals, and other active species. Moreover, through parallel connection, RT-DD reactors can be easily assembled into a larger system with the area of the working zone reaching 1 m². This offers a great potential for commercialization.