Biodegradable Plastic from Renewable Source
Journal Title: International journal of Emerging Trends in Science and Technology - Year 2017, Vol 4, Issue 6
Abstract
Materials used for food packaging today consist of a variety of petroleum-derived plastic polymer, metals, glass, paper and board, or combinations thereof. Among these packaging materials, plastic is found to be the best because of its long life properties. Thus, its utilization is increasing every day. However, plastics cannot be degraded by natural processes in a short period of time; therefore, they are left as plastic waste, causing environmental problems. Methods normally used to destroy other types of waste such as burning and burying are not suitable for plastic destruction. In response to these problems associated with plastic waste management, there has been considerable interest in the development and production of biodegradable plastics. The study aims to produce biodegradable plastic using cassava starch as its main component. Cassava and rubber seeds were obtained from Aluu and Omagwa villages in River state. The cassava tubers and rubber seeds oil were processed to obtain the starch and rubber seed oil respectively. The starch (filler) was mixed with water, rubber seed oil (cross linking agent), glycerol (plasticizer), and polyvinyl alcohol (binder). The mixture was heated at a temperature of 105 0C. Two different preparations were made by varying the starch, water, RSO and glycerol content mixture. The first preparation contained 50 grams starch, 50.0 grams water, 50.0 grams PVA, 10.0grams RSO, and 10.0 grams glycerol for the first batch .The mixture was stirred until it forms a thick sticky paste. The paste was then coagulated and passed through a two row mill. The resulting plastics and the polyethylene plastic which served as the control were cut into strips of equal dimensions (100 by 23 mm) for testing. The tensile strength test for the two different batches respectively were found to be 20.56 N/mm2 and 12.28 N/mm2 , while the polyethylene plastic was found to be 11.22 N/mm2 . The biodegradability test after burying the products for two weeks before unearthing revealed that the samples have biodegraded by reduction in dimensions; 22 by 12mm, and 28 by 15 for the two different batches respectively as against 100 by 23mm dimension for the polyethylene control which remain unchanged. The plastic produced showed biodegradability potential. It is therefore recommended that more work should be done in this field, especially in Nigeria so that we can have cleaner nations by reducing the conventional plastic waste in the environment
Authors and Affiliations
Jack I. R
Keywords
Related Articles
- EP ID EP245408
- DOI -
- Views 114
- Downloads 0
Full Authority Digital Engine Control (FADEC)
Full Authority Digital Engine Control (FADEC) Systems is a system consisting of a digital computer and ancillary components that control an aircraft’s engine and propeller. The system consists of a digital computer, call...
Control Strategy for Single-Phase Inverters in Distributed Generation Systems for improving Power Quality
This project deals with reactive power compensation and harmonic reduction by single-phase inverter for grid connected DG systems. The main theme is to integrate DG unit with shunt active Power filters. so that, the inve...
Detection and Isolation of Multiple Black Hole Attack Using Modified DSR
Mobile Ad hoc Network is a robust infrastructure less wireless network. It can be formed either by mobile nodes or by both fixed and mobile nodes. Nodes are randomly connected with each other and forming arbitrary topolo...
FODEX: Forensic Document Examiner –Using Graphology Science
Forensics document Examiner examines handwritten documents. The proposed system examines document using graphology science which generate a profile report of a person through handwritten text. The proposed system is a pa...
Temperature Control in HVAC Application using PID and Self-Tuning Adaptive Controller
Conventional Proportional Integral Derivative Controllers are used in many industrial applications due to their simplicity and robustness. The parameters of the various industrial processes are subjected to change due to...