Catalytic Pyrolysis Kinetic Behavior and TG-FTIR-GC–MS Analysis of Metallized Food Packaging Plastics with Different Concentrations of ZSM-5 Zeolite Catalyst

Abstract

Recently, the pyrolysis process has been adapted as a sustainable strategy to convert metallized food packaging plastics waste (MFPW) into energy products (paraffin wax, biogas, and carbon black particles) and to recover aluminum. Usually, catalysts are used in pyrolysis treatment to refine pyrolysis products and to increase their yield. In order to study the effect of a catalyst on the formulated volatile products, this work aims to study the pyrolysis behavior of MFPW in presence of catalyst, using TG-FTIR-GC–MS system. The pyrolysis experiments were conducted with ZSM-5 Zeolite catalyst with different concentrations (10, 30, and 50 wt.%) at different heating rates (5, 10, 15, 20, 25, and 30 °C/min). In addition, TG-FTIR system and GC-MS unit were used to observe and analyze the thermal and chemical degradation of the obtained volatile compounds at maximum decomposition peaks. In addition, the kinetic results of catalytic pyrolysis of ZSM-5/MFPW samples matched when model-free methods, a distributed activation energy model (DAEM), and an independent parallel reaction kinetic model (IPR) were used. The TGA-DTG results showed that addition of a catalyst did not have a significant effect on the features of the TGA-DTG curves with similar weight loss of 87–90 wt.% (without taking the weight of the catalyst into account). Meanwhile, FTIR results manifested strong presence of methane and high-intensity functional group of carboxylic acid residues, especially at high concentration of ZSM-5 and high heating rates. Likewise, GC-MS measurements showed that Benzene, Toluene, Hexane, p-Xylene, etc. compounds (main flammable liquid compounds in petroleum oil) generated catalysts exceeding 50%. Finally, pyrolysis kinetics showed that the whole activation energies of catalytic pyrolysis process of MFPW were estimated at 289 kJ/mol and 110, 350, and 174 kJ/mol for ZSM-5/MFPW samples (10, 30, and 50 wt.%, respectively), whereas DAEM and IPR approaches succeeded to simulate TGA and DTG profiles with deviations below <1.

Thermochemical Recycling of Waste Plastics by Pyrolysis: A Review

“…318 Similarly, TGA coupled with GC/MS has also been used to identify the chemical formula/structure of volatile products. 319 Undoubtedly, these advanced techniques provide rapid solutions to process design and optimization, catalyst evaluation, choice of feed and composition, and understanding synergetic effects during copyrolysis. 320 During TGA analysis, the weight loss patterns at different heating rates determine the degradation kinetics of plastic pyrolysis.…”

“…Meanwhile, quantitative pyrolysis coupled with more sophisticated characterization techniques such as GC/MS reveal chemical structural attributes of complex feed in addition to unique features of volatile species . Similarly, TGA coupled with GC/MS has also been used to identify the chemical formula/structure of volatile products . Undoubtedly, these advanced techniques provide rapid solutions to process design and optimization, catalyst evaluation, choice of feed and composition, and understanding synergetic effects during copyrolysis …”

Effect of Zeolite Catalyst on the Pyrolysis Kinetics of Multi-Layered Plastic Food Packaging

“…Regarding the ratio of polymer and material of MPFP to polyolefin mixtures, no particular information was provided [26]. A series of studies was done on the pyrolysis and catalytic pyrolysis of MPFP waste that contained aluminum, in addition to an examination of the kinetics of the process [27][28][29]. The amount of aluminum foil was established, although the content of polymers in these mixtures remains uncertain.…”

“…Previous studies on MPFP pyrolysis generated valuable products [24][25][26][27][28][29]. However, the focus of these studies was on particular types of MPFP rather than on the total makeup of the waste stream.…”

Pyrolysis Kinetic Behaviour of Glass Fibre-Reinforced Epoxy Resin Composites Using Linear and Nonlinear Isoconversional Methods

“…In addition, the kinetic pyrolysis of GFRC was studied using linear and nonlinear isoconversional methods. Finally, the TG curves were plotting using the distributed activation energy model (DAEM) and Independent Parallel Reactions Kinetic Model (IPR) [ 31 , 32 ].…”