On Thu, Sep 21, 2006 at 01:07:29AM -0700, Ralph Shumaker wrote: > Tracy R Reed wrote: > >William Eade wrote: ... > >It's all about thermal depolymerization. This technology could really > >save us. I don't understand why it isn't being pursued more actively. > > This sounds like a fancy name for "burning".
Only if you let air in. The fancy technology involves excluding air, using an external heat source, and collecting and purifying the reaction products. The objective is not just to destroy plastic but to obtain raw materials to make new plastic. Usually the reactions involved absorb energy rather than releasing it. Burning starts with similar reactions, but the flammable gases are allowed to react with air instead of being collected. The resulting heat keeps the reactions going without an outside heat source. If you are only interested in solid reaction products, especially charcoal, and you are willing to waste energy and valuable chemicals, some of which will be released into the air despite their toxicity, you can put your wood or whatever in an oven with a small vent at the top. If you set fire to it, the burning of the gases will char the wood without burning all of it. This is the old-fashioned and wasteful beehive oven method of making charcoal. Stewart Strait -- [email protected] http://www.kernel-panic.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/kplug-list
