Abstract
Thermal degradation is an attractive way to eliminate poly(methyl methacrylate) (PMMA) waste to which high temperatures are applied in the absence of oxygen. However, the process is not selective, resulting in a complex composition of products. Catalytic degradation over zeolites provides an effective route to selectively convert PMMA into desired products at lower temperatures, since zeolites have high acidity and shape-selectivity. In this work, the degradation of PMMA over various zeolites, including ZSM-5, BETA and USY, has been investigated in a batch reactor as a feasibility study to recover methyl methacrylate (MMA) as well as other valuable chemicals. The results showed that PMMA can be completely degraded at 300 oC and MMA was recovered as light oil. With increasing the degradation time, PMMA was converted over zeolites into more gaseous and light oil products, while the thermal degradation gave higher portion of heavy oil. From GC-MS analysis of light oil, MMA was found as the main product, co-existing with methyl 2-methyl propionate and methyl 2-methyl butyrate both of which can be used as synthetic fragrance.
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