Economic pre‐feasibility study for physical conversion of polyethylene terephthalate wastes to activated carbon

Abstract

Beneficial use of waste polymers is an important issue for environmental protection researchers. In this study, a brief summary has been presented for recycling methods of polyethylene terephthalate (PET) wastes. An economic pre‐feasibility study has been performed for the production of activated carbon from PET wastes. The proposed plant was used the physical activation process for the production of 10 000 t of activated carbon per year. The mass and energy balances and equipment designs of the process were performed using Aspen Plus 7.2 software. Asian countries have been selected as the location of this plant. The economic analysis of this plant for 2013 indicated that total capital investment and total production cost of plant were about $13 004 232 and $12 819 125, respectively. Using the economic criteria, the feasibility study of the project was conducted, and it was revealed that for a sale price of $1.7 per kg, minimum values of net present value ($418 486) and internal rate of return (15.33%) and the maximum value for payout period (25.44 years) have been reached. As it was expected, both net present value and internal rate of return increase by increasing sale price, while payout period decreases. This sensitivity analysis indicated that interest rate is the most effective parameter on net present value in each of the sale prices. © 2014 Curtin University of Technology and John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Recycling Carbon Resources from Waste PET to Reduce Carbon Dioxide Emission: Carbonization Technology Review and Perspective

“…The produced carbon materials can be an adsorbent candidate for water decontamination with cheap cost, large scale, and chemical stability (such as eliminating radioactive metals, methylene blue dyes, etc.) [32][33][34]. Moreover, functional carbon materials with unique micro-or nano-structures can also be obtained by using different precursors from waste PET, including hierarchical porous carbon for symmetric supercapacitors [35], carbon nanofibers for multifunctional surfaces [31], carbon nanotubes [36], magnetic carbon nanomaterials [37], graphene [38], etc., as shown in Fig.…”

Utilization of polyethylene terephthalate waste as a carbon filler in polypropylene matrix: Investigation of mechanical, rheological, and thermal properties

“…The PET has more carbon in the molecular chain (above 60%), and its pyrolysis yields a higher amount of carbon as a residue 34 . It is reported that the activated carbon from waste PET finds application as an adsorbent in natural gas storage, 35 CO 2 capture, 36,37 and so forth.…”

“…33 The PET has more carbon in the molecular chain (above 60%), and its pyrolysis yields a higher amount of carbon as a residue. 34 It is reported that the activated carbon from waste PET finds application as an adsorbent in natural gas storage, 35 CO 2 capture, 36,37 and so forth. The carbon procured after pyrolysis has various characteristics, such as a large surface area, less functional groups and low concentration of impurities than the carbon collected from biomass pyrolysis.…”

Synthesis of metal nanoparticles for use as nanocatalysts in pet recycling

“…Poly (ethylene terephthalate) can be produced from two initial reactions: by esterification, in which terephthalic acid (TPA) reacts with ethylene glycol (EG), and also by the transesterification reaction, by reacting dimethyl terephthalate (DTM) with ethylene glycol (EG) (Torrik, Nejati, & Soleimani, 2014).…”