Abstract
Nowadays, due to environmental pollution and natural energy consumption caused by waste paper, many researches are being conducted on the reuse of printed-paper. To recycle the paper, de-inking has to be performed. In this article, in order to reduce the use of the commonly used de-inking chemicals, the effect of an atmospheric pressure helium plasma treatment on the de-inking enhancement of printed-paper is studied. Through colorimeter and UV-visible spectrometer measurements the plasma treatment is shown to speed up the de-inking. While SEM observations and FTIR measurements suggest that the paper quality is retained upon plasma treatment, the increase of surface hydrophilicity measured by water contact angle measurements, compared to non-treated paper, is believed to enhance the fiber swelling of the paper and lead to a faster ink removal.
Highlights
Paper industry is well known to consume enormous quantities of raw materials and energy
As swelling of paper fibers favors the ink particles detachment, the increase of surface hydrophilicity induced by the plasma treatment is believed to play an important role in the de-inking enhancement
The increased wetting of both sides of the paper leads to the fast absorption of water compared to non-plasma-treated paper and is believed to enhance the fiber swelling of the paper and accelerate the ink removal
Summary
Paper industry is well known to consume enormous quantities of raw materials and energy. Among the various de-inking methods, chemicals such as peroxides, caustic soda, and surfactants are commonly used[1,4] The use of these chemicals leads to polluted water production and to costly waste water treatments[1,2,3,4]. An atmospheric pressure helium plasma treatment-based method is studied. Pawlat et al show the increase of hydrophilicity of the paper via treatment with a plasma jet[11]. Pykönen et al study the atmospheric pressure plasma treatment of different types of paper with various plasma reactors and discuss the origin of the increase of surface energy upon plasma treatment[12]. To the best of our knowledge, no works on the effect of an atmospheric pressure plasma treatment on the de-inking of inkjet-printed paper are reported in the literature. On the basis of these results, the de-inking mechanism is discussed
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