A new process would help to recycle the polyethylene from the bags. Source: image edited by 
For me there are two problems with this type of material: firstly it is very light, I live in a city with strong winds, and it is common to see bags being carried by the breeze, these end up being caught by a tree or end up on the beach; and the second is that after being used it becomes a material of little value, so it is more expensive to recycle it than to produce it again, which generates little incentive to recover the waste. This makes them end up being a big problem for the environment.
But this could change with a new procedure developed by the University of California, Berkeley. This procedure converts polyethylene-based plastic into a strong adhesive, which would make the plastics used into a more valuable raw material.
According to the results reported for Chem magazine, the chemical process developed is based on the selective catalytic oxidation of the C-H bonds in basic polyethylenes with variable weights and molecular architectures. Through this procedure, a chemical group is added to the polymer that makes it adhere to the metal, something that this type of polyolefins does badly, in addition, it adds another type of physical properties that were previously absent in these materials, such as the ability to be painted with water-based latex paints. And on the other hand, the procedure does not alter other physical properties that are highly desired in the polymers, such as their manageability, thermal stability and mechanical resistance.
Schematic image of the reaction. Source: image designed by
To carry out the reaction, the group of researchers used a catalyst based on ruthenium, a metal that has exhibited strong functionalization for the functionalization of a methylene position. Perhaps I should mention that polyethylene is a large molecule made up of a sea of C-H bonds, each CH2 group is a methylene and we can find several thousand of them in a single molecule. And the catalyst developed is capable of operating at the temperatures needed to melt the polyethylene and add an OH group to the polymer chain without breaking this chain. This reaction produces a polyethylene material that adheres strongly to metals.
Although the procedure is still in an experimental phase, it opens up many opportunities for this development, as polyethylene residues could be used to make adhesives to bond metals or other polymers to each other, or cable sheaths or other metals that must be protected by a polymer layer. Therefore, the method described indicates that polyethylene modified by this catalyst could help turn plastic waste into higher value and potentially more sustainable products. Hopefully the technology can be implemented and help us solve an old problem.
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