Sunshine and CO2 combine for eco-friendly plastic production

Academics hope to turn a polluting process “on its head” by harnessing sunshine and carbon dioxide to help produce plastic.

Led by Ted Sargent at the University of Toronto in Canada, the team envision a system of capturing carbon dioxide from industrial processes and treating it using renewable electricity to transform it into ethylene (C₂H₄). The common industrial chemical is a precursor to many plastics, such as those used in shopping bags.

The system could transform existing carbon-capture technologies into a viable economic proposition, said the researchers.

To tackle the issue, they created a thin, copper-based catalyst for CO₂ conversion to ethylene, which reportedly led to the highest ever efficiency for the reaction. They also deposited the catalyst on a porous support layer of polytetrafluoroethylene, better known as Teflon, and sandwiched it with carbon on the other side.

The new set-up protects the support and catalyst from degrading due to the high-pH solution used in the process, helping it last 15 times longer than previous catalysts.

The CO₂  conversion system can perform on a laboratory scale, producing several grams of ethylene at a time. The team's goal is to scale-up the technology so it can convert multiple tonnes of chemicals needed for commercial application.

“As a group, we are strongly motivated to develop technologies that help us realise the global challenge of a carbon-neutral future,” said Sargent.

The paper appeared in Science.