TY - JOUR
AU - Marco Tobías, Mariano
AU - Åhlén, Michelle
AU - Cheung, Ocean
AU - Bucknall, David G.
AU - McCoustra, Martin R. S.
AU - Yiu, Humphrey Hak Ping
PY - 2023
DA - April
TI - Plasma degradation of contaminated PPE: an energy-efficient method to treat contaminated plastic waste
JO - npj Materials Degradation
VL - 7
DO - https://doi.org/10.1038/s41529-023-00350-9
AB - The use of PPE has drastically increased because of the SARS-CoV-2 (COVID-19) pandemic as disposable surgical face masks made from non-biodegradable polypropylene (PP) polymers have generated a significant amount of waste. In this work, a low-power plasma method has been used to degrade surgical masks. Several analytical techniques (gravimetric analysis, scanning electron microscopy (SEM), attenuated total reflection-infra-red spectroscopy (ATR-IR), x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), thermogravimetric analysis/differential scanning calorimetry (TGA/DSC) and wide-angle x-ray scattering (WAXS)) were used to evaluate the effects of plasma irradiation on mask samples. After 4 h of irradiation, an overall mass loss of 63 ± 8%, through oxidation followed by fragmentation, was observed on the non-woven 3-ply surgical mask, which is 20 times faster than degrading a bulk PP sample. Individual components of the mask also showed different degradation rates. Air plasma clearly represents an energy-efficient tool for treating contaminated PPE in an environmentally friendly approach.
PB - Springer Nature
UR - https://researchportal.hw.ac.uk/en/publications/9b29587a-6e1a-4c1e-b624-f0982f25781d
KW - Coronavirus (COVID-19)
ER