Recycling of plastics derived from end-of-life (EOL) electronic equipment

This research work focuses on a chemical process to separate mixed plastics from EOL electronic equipment.;The most prominent components of waste plastics, PC (Polycarbonate), PS (Polystyrene) and ABS (Acylonitrile Butadiene Styrene) from obsolete computers are taken to be samples in this work. Qualitative analysis was carried out to identify these samples using FT-IR (Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscope). Quantitative analysis was performed using Elemental Analyzer to get the calibration curves for PC/PS and PC/ABS. A number of organic solvents were investigated to dissolve the desired samples. A series of separation experiments were carried out with PC/PS, PC/ABS, and PC/PS/ABS mixtures under optimized conditions. Overall mass balances checked for each experiment. Recovery in all experiments in this study is over 95% by making material balance.;Cyclohexane and acetone were appropriate solvents for PS and ABS respectively. Water and ethanol were used as antisolvents. Purity of over 97% of recovered PC is observed for all separation experiments. Both PS and ABS are also purified during the separation process. A preliminary economic analysis was carried out and the feasibility of this chemical separation method is checked.

Name thesis:degree_name

MS

Level thesis:degree_level

Thesis

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Chemical and Biomedical Engineering

Year dc:date.available

2004

Author dc:creator

• Cheng, Xiufang

Contributors dc:contributor

• Richard Turton.

• Chemical engineering
• Plastics

Identifier

https://researchrepository.wvu.edu/etd/1531

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:researchrepository.wvu.edu:etd-2534