Heavy oil/plastic co-processing - subtask 4.1. Topical report, February 1, 1994--February 1, 1995

Western Research Institute (WRI) is developing a low-temperature thermal decomposition process to alleviate the problems associated with disposal of waste plastics and at the same time generate a product stream in the gasoline boiling range for use in the refining and petrochemical industries. The technology being developed by WRI is significantly different from conventional thermal decomposition processes used to recover distillates from waste plastics. The key to this difference is the application of a decomposition initiator concept that allows operation of the process at temperatures below those used in other thermal decomposition processes. The WRI technology utilizes the decomposition initiator to enhance thermal decomposition of waste plastics in the presence of a low-value heavy oil at temperatures below those normally used for thermal decomposition. Operation of the process at lower temperatures produces higher yields of distillate product and lower yields of gaseous and char products than conventional processes. The activity of the initiator was identified in earlier research studying the thermal decomposition of polymers. This activity was observed to result in a decrease in the temperature required to thermally decompose plastics in the presence of a heavy oil. These early experiments indicated that the initiator was native to the plastics matrix, but the identity and possible mode of action were not determined. This study was undertaken to identify the active initiator in the plastics matrix and define its activity. The experiments performed in this study were conducted in a batch-type reactor. The particular elements of the activity that were addressed included: (1) the kinetics of the reaction, (2) the effects of diluting the plastics with the heavy oil, and (3) the effects of using different types of heavy oil