Professor Justin Perry Archives

New products from high-grade polymer particulate waste streams

TransFIRe researchers at Northumbria University have developed a method to convert waste polyethylene terephthalate (wPET) into an unsaturated polyester for use in protective coatings applications, thereby also lowering the demand of virgin petrochemical feedstocks typically required to produce these polyesters. State of the art mechanical separation of mixed plastics which are predominantly PET at recycling centres works by converting large objects into a “flake” which can be separated efficiently into very high purity recycled wPET content. However, a proportion of the throughput can only be purified to 90-99% PET purity due to the presence of small and often highly coloured flakes of other plastics, and hence has no commercial value. This fraction of the wPET process is incinerated or sent to landfill rather than used in closed loop recycling. These so called “flake losses” account for around 160 ktpa of PET lost from the closed loop recycling process in Europe [...]

TransFIRe partner collaboration on the tiles

In the summer of last year, a range of teams from across TransFIRe began working with Zentia, a ceiling tile manufacturer in Gateshead, to develop a case study focused on reducing energy usage, capturing and reusing waste heat and exploring the use of additives and alternative product mixtures to improve the material properties of their products. Zentia’s factory produces ceiling tiles formed from a wet mixture of newsprint, starch, fibreglass and other minerals, which are then pressed and dried by passing through a long series of gas-fired ovens. The manufacturing process generates large amounts of steam and hot air and offers significant potential for heat and water recovery projects. Initially brought into the TransFIRe programme by Professor Justin Perry and Dr Matt Unthank, Chemical Technical Working Group members from Northumbria University, to explore the use of alternative tile coatings, the engineering and management team at Zentia also expressed interest [...]