Research & Development World

  • Home Page
  • Topics
    • Aerospace
    • Archeology
    • Automotive
    • Biotech
    • Chemistry
    • COVID-19
    • Environment
    • Energy
    • Life Science
    • Material Science
    • R&D Market Pulse
    • R&D Management
    • Physics
  • Technology
    • 3D Printing
    • A.I./Robotics
    • Battery Technology
    • Controlled Environments
      • Cleanrooms
      • Graphene
      • Lasers
      • Regulations/Standards
      • Sensors
    • Imaging
    • Nanotechnology
    • Scientific Computing
      • Big Data
      • HPC/Supercomputing
      • Informatics
      • Security
      • Software
    • Semiconductors
  • 2021 R&D 100 Award Winners
    • R&D 100 Awards
    • 2020 Winners
    • Winner Archive
  • Resources
    • Digital Issues
    • Podcasts
    • Subscribe
  • Global Funding Forecast
  • Webinars

Department of Energy to invest $25M in polymer upcyling, plastic waste reuse research

By Heather Hall | February 11, 2021

From the office of the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) this week announced plans to invest $25 mil in fundamental science to lay the groundwork for technology that finds reuses for plastic waste, makes strides toward addressing the global plastic waste crisis and reduces the climate impacts of plastic production.

DOE’s research investment will focus on polymer upcycling, the process of efficiently deconstructing and rebuilding polymers, which are the essential building blocks of plastics. Polymer upcycling has the potential to turn waste plastic into chemicals, fuels and other products of value and greatly reduce the high energy costs associated with plastic production.

“Polymer upcycling holds the promise of boosting reuse of plastic waste and lowering the energy costs of plastic production,” said Dr. Steve Binkley, acting director of DOE’s Office of Science. “This research will provide insights into chemical and materials phenomena that will be critical to accelerating developments in this emerging area.”

Less than 10% of waste plastics are currently recycled in the United States, and globally plastic waste is a growing environmental threat, especially to rivers and oceans that absorb many millions of tons of such waste each year. Fundamental breakthroughs in chemistry and materials science are needed to increase the reuse of discarded plastics and thereby reduce the accumulation of plastic waste in the environment.

Expanding the reuse of plastics through polymer upcycling also has the potential to significantly cut down on the environmental impacts of plastic production, an energy-intensive and greenhouse gas emitting process that uses almost exclusively petroleum and natural gas. The development of new, lower energy polymer upcycling processes could bring major energy savings for an industry that consumes 6% of the nation’s entire energy output annually, according to DOE estimates.

The funding opportunity, titled “Chemical Upcycling of Polymers” is part of a series of research efforts sponsored under DOE’s Plastic Innovation Challenge, which was launched in 2019 to make domestic processing of plastic waste more economically viable and energy-efficient, develop new and improved plastic materials and ultimately reduce plastic waste accumulation.

The research sponsored under this funding opportunity will pursue basic discoveries to enable energy-efficient deconstruction and reassembly of polymers, to improve polymer properties, and to enable the more efficient reuse of polymer components.

National laboratories, universities, industry and nonprofit organizations will be eligible to lead applications for the three-year awards, which will be selected based on peer review. The Office of Basic Energy Sciences (BES) within the Department’s Office of Science, which is funding the effort, envisions awards both for single investigators and larger teams.

Total planned funding is $25 mil for projects of three years in duration, with $8.3 mil in Fiscal Year 2021 dollars and outyear funding contingent on congressional appropriations. The Funding Opportunity Announcement can be found on the BES funding opportunities page.

Comments

  1. Sanjay Patel says

    October 20, 2021 at 4:35 pm

    It is about time that this takes place. I am very interested in learning about how this set-up works. I have few concerns; it is very admirable that government is finally considering this valuable but we have lot to catch up considering the vast quantities of plastic waste which by the way remains more to be mechanical in nature Vs chemical to address the real problem. Secondly the amount of investment is too little for the scale of the problem the human kind is facing and waiting for three year turn around is loss of considerable and very valuable time! The problem needs to be solved on an international level to exploit all possibilities. The project needs to run as a profit driven problem not just a scientific curiosity.

    Reply

Tell Us What You Think! Cancel reply

Related Articles Read More >

Glowing rocks, a new sport, and what we can learn about different approaches
Designer materials to keep plastic out of landfills
Researchers measure photovoltaic external quantum efficiency to transform the future of solar cells
Argonne webinar to explore the challenges of recycling lithium-ion batteries and solutions
2021 R&D Global Funding Forecast

Need R&D World news in a minute?

We Deliver!
R&D World Enewsletters get you caught up on all the mission critical news you need in research and development. Sign up today.
Enews Signup

R&D World Digital Issues

February 2020 issue

Browse the most current issue of R&D World and back issues in an easy to use high quality format. Clip, share and download with the leading R& magazine today.

Research & Development World
  • Subscribe to R&D World Magazine
  • Enews Sign Up
  • Contact Us
  • About Us
  • Drug Discovery & Development
  • Pharmaceutical Processing
  • 2022 Global Funding Forecast

Copyright © 2022 WTWH Media LLC. All Rights Reserved. The material on this site may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, cached or otherwise used, except with the prior written permission of WTWH Media
Privacy Policy | Advertising | About Us

Search R&D World

  • Home Page
  • Topics
    • Aerospace
    • Archeology
    • Automotive
    • Biotech
    • Chemistry
    • COVID-19
    • Environment
    • Energy
    • Life Science
    • Material Science
    • R&D Market Pulse
    • R&D Management
    • Physics
  • Technology
    • 3D Printing
    • A.I./Robotics
    • Battery Technology
    • Controlled Environments
      • Cleanrooms
      • Graphene
      • Lasers
      • Regulations/Standards
      • Sensors
    • Imaging
    • Nanotechnology
    • Scientific Computing
      • Big Data
      • HPC/Supercomputing
      • Informatics
      • Security
      • Software
    • Semiconductors
  • 2021 R&D 100 Award Winners
    • R&D 100 Awards
    • 2020 Winners
    • Winner Archive
  • Resources
    • Digital Issues
    • Podcasts
    • Subscribe
  • Global Funding Forecast
  • Webinars