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Upcycling Municipal Solid Waste to Polymers and Bioethanol
Summary
Scientists developed a new way to turn regular household trash into useful products like plastic materials and ethanol fuel, without needing to sort or clean the garbage first. This method could help reduce the massive amounts of waste going to landfills and incinerators, which often release harmful chemicals into the air and water that can affect human health. The process appears to be both economically viable and better for the environment than current waste disposal methods.
Abstract Municipal solid waste (MSW) is heterogeneous and contaminated, making integrated valorization difficult. Here we directly process raw MSW using a platform that couples solvent-targeted recovery and precipitation (STRAP) with enzymatic hydrolysis and fermentation to co-produce plastic resins and ethanol. Thermodynamically guided solvent selection enables STRAP to recover polyolefins (PE and PP) from the plastic fraction while enriching the remaining biogenic fraction. The residue is enzymatically hydrolyzed to generate concentrated fermentable sugars, which are converted to ethanol via microbial fermentation. Demonstrating performance on real, unwashed MSW establishes robustness to unavoidable feed variability and contamination and provides a practical circular pathway linking high-quality polymer recovery with biochemical fuel production. Techno-economic analysis and life-cycle assessment indicate the integrated system can be economically promising and reduce environmental impacts relative to conventional disposal and production routes.