Green composites of organic materials and recycled post-consumer polyethylene

International audienceAddition of organic fillers to post‐consumer recycled plastics can give rise to several advantages. First of all, the cost of these fillers is usually very low, the organic fillers are biodegradable contributing to an improved environmental impact and, last but not least, some mechanical and thermomechanical properties can be enhanced. Organic fillers are not widely used in the plastic industry although their use is increasing. Bad dispersion into the polymer matrix at high‐level content and poor adhesion with the matrix are the more important obstacles to this approach. In this work various organic fillers have been used with a post‐consumer plastic material originating from films for greenhouses. The properties of these green composites have been compared with those of materials filled with a conventional inorganic filler. The organic fillers cause slightly worse processability, due to an increase of viscosity, an enhancement of the rigidity and of the thermomechanical resistance similar to that measured for the inorganic filler, while a reduction of the impact strength is observed. Copyright © 2004 Society of Chemical Industry

Recycling of plastics from packaging

Plastic waste coming from the separate collection of packaging film was recycled and characterized. The material is a blend of low density and linear low density polyethylene and after recycling shows mechanical and rheological properties depending on the processing conditions and apparatus. High processing temperature and high residence times strongly enhance the degradation processes and reduce the mechanical properties, in particular the elongation at break. A possible use of this recycled plastic is for the production of low pressure pipes but the properties are lower than those of virgin pipe grade polyethylene. By introducing additives, like antioxidants, inert fillers and impact modifiers, the mechanical properties improve and approach those of virgin pipe grade polyethylene

On the interlayer spacing collapse of Cloisite 30B organoclay

When used as a nanofiller for the preparation of polymer/clay nanocomposites (PCNs), Cloisite 30B (30B) often undergoes a d-spacing collapse, as demonstrated by a shift to wider angles of the XRD basal reflection. Such collapse has been variously attributed to organoclay contamination or, more often, to thermal degradation of the organic modifier with expulsion of the volatile products from the galleries. In this work, several PCNs loaded with 30B have been prepared by melt compounding, using different polymer matrices, and have subsequently been subjected to dissolution in appropriate solvents followed by precipitation in excess non-solvent and room temperature drying. An XRD analysis of the products has shown that this treatment makes the 30B basal plane reflection go back to the original angular position. These experiments indicate that, contrary to the situation prevailing when 30B is subjected to thermal treatments at temperatures well above the onset of degradation (180 °C), the d-spacing collapse observed after melt compounding 30B with polymer matrices at moderate temperatures is in fact a reversible phenomenon probably due to rearrangement of the alkyl chains of the clay modifier in a disposition intermediate between bilayer and monolayer

Photooxidative behaviour of polyethylene/polyamide-6 blends

International audienceThe photochemical behaviour of several polyethylene/polyamide-6 blends was studied under conditions of artificial accelerated weathering. Particular attention was paid to five different compositions ranging from pure polyethylene to pure polyamide with blends of PE/PA-6 of various compositions: 75/25, 50/50 and 25/75 wt/wt%. Analysis by infrared spectroscopy of the chemical modifications caused by photooxidation showed that exposing the polyethylene/polyamide-6 blends to UV-light irradiation led to the formation of oxidation photoproducts in both polymer phases. In agreement with both the mechanical and spectroscopic analyses, the photooxidation rate of the blends was observed to be much higher than that of the homopolymers. The results given in this paper suggest that photooxidation of the PE/PA blends starts in the polyamide phase and that the subsequent photooxidation of the polyethylene phase may be initiated by the radicals coming from the oxidation of PA