Pyrolysis: An effective technique for degradation of COVID-19 medical wastes

Abstract

COVID-19 has led to the enormous rise of medical wastes throughout the world, and these have mainly been generated from hospitals, clinics, and other healthcare establishments. This creates an additional challenge in medical waste management, particularly in developing countries. Improper managing of medical waste may have serious public health issues and a significant impact on the environment. There are currently three disinfection technologies, namely incineration, chemical, and physical, that are available to treat COVID-19 medical waste (CMW). This study focuses on thermochemical process, particularly the pyrolysis process to treat medical waste. Pyrolysis is a process that utilizes the instability of organic components in medical waste to convert it into valuable products. Besides, the technique is environmentally friendly, more efficient, requires less landfill capacity, causes lower pollution, and cost-effective. The current pandemic situation generates a high amount of plastic medical waste, which has components like polyethylene (PE), polypropylene (PP), polystyrene (PS), polyethylene terephthalate (PET) and nylon (N). These plastic wastes can be converted into valuable energy products like oil, gas and char through the pyrolysis process. This study provides detailed information about CMW handling, treatments, valuable product generations (biofuels), and proper discharge into the open environment.

Estimation of COVID-19 waste generation and composition in Vietnam for pandemic management

“…Plastic was the most predominant component of COVID-19 waste at 76.7% (Figure 5), consistent with that reported in the literature (Benson et al, 2021;Dharmaraj et al, 2021;Purnomo et al, 2021). Although with a small unit weight of around 210 g, PPE clothing composed of high-density polyethylene contributed the most to the plastic material in COVID-19 waste, at nearly 59%, resulting from the massive adoption of PPE clothing during the pandemic.…”

Novel strategy in biohydrogen energy production from COVID - 19 plastic waste: A critical review

“…Pyrolysis is a thermochemical process, a high temperatures and anaerobic conditions are used to disintegrate the solid and liquid organic materials present in plastic waste. The macromolecular compounds that exist in the waste get disintegrated into simpler compounds such as carbonaceous materials (char and tar), crude synthetic gases, and liquid fuels depend on the process condition [ 107 , 108 ]. Further, the products so formed can be refined into pure chemicals or fuels.…”

Resource Resurgence from COVID-19 Waste via Pyrolysis: a Circular Economy Approach

“…no. Type of waste materials Polymer type Pyrolysis temperature (K) Resource recovery Country References 1 Face mask, PPE kits, packaging materials PP 723 92.3% oil, 4.1% gas, and 3.6% char India [ 34 ] 2. 3-ply face mask PP 678 - 783 96.6% volatiles, chemical compounds, including pentane, 2,4-dimethyl-1-heptene Lithuania, Russia & Egypt [ 35 ] 3.…”