Biopolymers and Carbon Footprint
Be the change you want to see in the world
Drastically is occurred overpopulation in the earth day by day. This situation give rise to the source reduction, carbon footprint increase and some transboundary sustainability troubles. One of these problems is the environmental pollution and carbon footprints caused by synthetic polymers during production and after they have end of life their. Ingrao and colleagues carbon footprint are defined as both carbon dioxide and methane emissions.
Environmental Effects of the synthetic polymers ?
Synthetic polymers are identified high molecular weight plastics produced petroleum based industrially and laboratory on scale polystyrene, polyethylene, polyvinyl chloride.
Synthetic polymers damage the atmosphere, marine ecosystem, soil and underground habitats. During only the production carbon dioxide emissions values of the petroleum based polyolefins are between 2.5 and 3.4 kg CO2/kg polymer. Their energy requirements are between 73.7 and 85.9 MJ/kg polymer (Harding and et. al., 2007). About 60.5% of the sea turtles in Brazil were negatively affected by synthetic polymers (Sharma and Chatterjee, 2017). Moore find that own study 44% of the sea birds ingested synthetic polymers. Size and concentration of the synthetic polyethylene particles affect burrowing activities by causing stress in which the earthworm species E. fedida, Eisenia andrei and L. terrestris (Leonov and Tiunov, 2020). Not only synthetic polymers during their production are adversely environmental effects, but also handling of the disposal methods their after end of life. According to data, 20.60% of synthetic plastics were disposed of by incineration and 31% by sending them to landfills in 2015 year. Not only this situation brought about volatile organic compounds and carbon emissions from combustion, but also an economic loss of 1.9 billion euros.
What’s the solution?
Biobased and biodegradable polymers can be used instead of synthetic polymers in order to contribute to the green economy and drop off environmental pollution. Biopolymers can be defined high molecular weight natural plastics which manufacturing from organic wastes. Biopolymers have chemical hydrophilic structure so, soluble in the water. Also, they are biodegradable after their end of life. Biopolymers are polysaccharide derivative sugars, poly amino acid, polyhydroxyalkanoate, and poly lactic acid (Meereboer and et. al., 2020). Usage areas of the biopolymers are medical technology devices production, textile, chemistry, biotechnology, automotive and packaging sectors.
6 million ton per year has been prevented the its waste due to 100% herbal Bioleather product which biopolymer production from olive pomace by Biolive and Rebil Group in Turkey. Cornleaf was produced Ingeo poly lactic acid by Radici Group and this material compostable at 100%. Polyamide 11 will be produced from 100% derived from castor beans France company which by Arkema in the Singapore plant. Ecoflex was derived from poly lactic acid and Ecovio was manufactured from coffee capsules Germany company which by BASF.
So what did we understand?
Not only synthetic polymers negatively affect living life’s, but also economic sustainability of the countries. If you love to world, hear its out. Production and sales of the biopolymers the best thing since sliced bread and its ensure great contribute to bioeconomy.
References and Related Links
Ingrao, C., Tricase, C., Cholewa-Wójcik, A., Kawecka, A., Rana, R., & Siracusa, V. (2015). Polylactic acid trays for fresh-food packaging: A Carbon Footprint assessment. Science of the Total Environment, 537, 385–398.
https://www.chemie.de/lexikon/Polymer.html.
Harding, K. G., Dennis, J. S., Von Blottnitz, H., & Harrison, S. T. L. (2007). Environmental analysis of plastic production processes: Comparing petroleum-based polypropylene and polyethylene with biologically-based poly-β-hydroxybutyric acid using life cycle analysis. Journal of biotechnology, 130(1), 57–66.
Sharma, S., & Chatterjee, S. (2017). Microplastic pollution, a threat to marine ecosystem and human health: a short review. Environmental Science and Pollution Research, 24(27), 21530–21547.
Moore, C. J. (2008). Synthetic polymers in the marine environment: a rapidly increasing, long-term threat. Environmental research, 108(2), 131–139.
Leonov, V. D., & Tiunov, A. V. (2020). Interaction of invertebrates and synthetic polymers in soil: a review. Russian Journal of Ecology, 51(6), 503–517.
Meereboer, K. W., Misra, M., & Mohanty, A. K. (2020). Review of recent advances in the biodegradability of polyhydroxyalkanoate (PHA) bioplastics and their composites. Green Chemistry, 22(17), 5519–5558.
https://renewable-carbon.eu/news/biopolymere-rohstoffe-technologien-anwendungen/.
https://techxtile.net/files/TechXtile-Start-Up-Challenge-Finale-Kalanlar.pdf.
https://www.radicigroup.com/en/products/fibres-and-nw/poy-starlight/biopolymer-cornleaf.
https://bioplasticsnews.com/arkema/.
https://www.basf.com/tr/tr/who-we-are/innovation/our-innovations/compostable-polymer.html.
