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Plasma degradation of contaminated PPE: an energy-efficient method to treat contaminated plastic waste
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Researchers used low-power plasma irradiation to degrade COVID-19 PPE masks made of polypropylene, achieving over 60% mass loss in four hours through oxidation and fragmentation. While this explores a disposal route for plastic waste, the fragmentation process also highlights how PPE can break down into microplastics, underscoring the need for better degradation technologies that fully mineralize plastic rather than just fragmenting it.
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.
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