what non-fossil fuel product are you taking the plastic from?

Carbon Dioxide. It has been known since the 50's that you can polymerize CO2 with various aliphatic epoxides. The problem is it occurs and VERY high pressure and temperature (thus energy demanding) and the products are not well controlled (you get a big mixture of various polymers). By designing an appropriate catalyst it should be possible to not only reduce the temperature and pressure required, but control the end product for desired material properties.

Yes you do need epoxides, but the bulk of the carbon will come for the CO2, a natural resource.

Biodegradable or easily recyclable plastics for storage have already been made this way (research level quantities only); it is just currently more costly to make it that way due to the inefficiencies of the processes then just about anything else you can imagine.

NASA has already expressed interest in funding the project, as being able to make plastics on long missions or easily recycle plastics and turn them into other parts is a huge advantage for long missions.

i would think that the acid is not exactly environmentally friendly either.

Ehh, typical acids are easily converted to mostly water. The counter ion the acid is the real danger, but they are not that hard to deal with, and you can usually make other lucrative products with those counter ions. They (the acids) are also good for more then one usage typically, and can be cleaned.

Not that I am saying paper recycling plants do that, I got no clue. Some might. Others probably just dump the excess waste chemical in the ground...




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This comment was edited on Aug 31, 23:20.