Evaluación de la reacción de descomposición térmica de plásticos de polipropileno reciclado como fuente alternativa de combustibles.

Abstract

The objective of this research work was to evaluate the suitability of recycled polypropylene plastic waste as an alternative fuel source. For this investigation, a TGA 1 STAR System thermogravimetric analyzer was used, in which samples were tested between 11 and 15 milligrams, with a particle size of approximately 1 mm; were subjected to a constant heating rate of 30 ° C min -1, in a nitrogen atmosphere. The results show a temperature of thermal degradation that oscillated between 450 ° C and 478 ° C, the permanence time is 17 minutes for the conversion of 98.83%, an activation energy 189 kJ mol-1, of the first reaction order and a pre-exponential factor of 0.1523 s-1. The kinetic parameters were evaluated using the Friedman method for the model proposal. The presence of resins combined with polypropylene and additives such as 2,4-Di-tert-butyl-6- (5-chloro-2H-benzotriazole-2-yl) phenol, modify the thermal degradation kinetics of polypropylene, although not in a significant way with respect to the results reported by other researchers for virgin polypropylene. This demonstrates the essential requirement to have a kinetic model based on the adjustment of the experimental points, prior to the implementation in a pilot or industrial scale reactor.