PET glycolysis optimization using ionic liquid [Bmin]ZnCl3 as catalyst and kinetic evaluation

• Main Authors: Carlos Vinícius Guimarães Silva, Eloi Alves da Silva Filho, Fabrício Uliana, Luciana Fernanda Rangel de Jesus, Carlos Vital Paixão de Melo, Rosangela Cristina Barthus, José Guilherme Aquino Rodrigues, Gabriela Vanini
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Associação Brasileira de Polímeros 2018-11-01
• Series: Polímeros
• Subjects: PET; glycolysis; ionic liquids; design of experiments; activation energy energy
• Online Access: http://www.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0104-14282018005006101&lng=en&tlng=en
• ISSN: 1678-5169

Abstract In the present work, the depolymerization of polyethylene terephthalate (PET) was performed by the method of glycolysis with ethylene glycol. The process was carried out using a factorial design in the Box-Behnken optimization model, using a response surface methodology (RSM) in which three factors (time, temperature and mass ratio of ethylene glycol) were studied in three levels of variation (- 1, 0, +1) with two replicates of the center point, totalizing 15 experiments for which the yield of bis (2-hydroxyethyl) terephthalate (BHET) monomers formed in the process was chosen as response. In parallel, the Arrhenius kinetic test was used to determine the apparent activation energy (Ea) for the 1-butyl-3-methylimidazole trichlorozincate ([Bmin]ZnCl3) - catalyst used in the depolymerization process. The products of glycolysis obtained were characterized by spectroscopic techniques (FTIR), (1 H and 13C NMR), thermal analyses (TGA) and (DSC) and Mass Spectrometry LC-MS/MS hybrid Quadrupole-Orbitrap.