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Recycling plastics with aromatic diamines to form polyamide-imides to make an asphalt substitute

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Contrived _voice

Contrived _voice Dec 29, 2021

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Recycling plastics with aromatic diamines to form polyamide-imides to make an asphalt substitute to cut down the carbon emissions from the production of genuine asphalt and help clear landfills.
Why?
The emissions produced when making a new car is equivalent to building just two metres of road.Between 2000 and 2016, the U.S. built an average of 30,427 lane miles of roadway per year, adding 63.4 square miles(164.2052 square kilometres) per year to the amount of land covered by roads. That is just the U.S. The global consequence is a surprisingly steep rise in emmissions as more countries continues to develop the numbers just keep rising. (Emission sources).Further sources are listed below.
Assessment Tool to Estimate CO2 Emissions of Pavement Production and Construction, Kamil E. Kaloush et al.
Espinoza M. et al., Carbon Footprint Estimation in Road Construction: La Abundancia–Florencia Case Study, 2019.
Solution
Polyamide-imides PAI. these are amorphous polymers that have exceptional mechanical, thermal and chemical resistant properties .(Properties) These properties make them ideal for asphalt substitutes.They can withstand high tempratures thus are suitable for roads in tropical and mediteranian climates. Low thermal expansivity allows for the production of modular roads which could reduce expenses in road mentainance. Of course the standard industrial method of production makes it very expensive limiting its utility greatly.
Practicality
A method of Polyamide-imide synthesis using different monomer sequences. Plastics are polymers thus are long chains of monomers. By breaking up the apropriate polymers it is possible to derive the necessary monomers for PAI synthesis. The PAI's formed show a reduction resistivity but not a significant enough decrease to affect utility.(source).The reduction in cost plus the availability of plastics may make this idea highly practical.

carbon footprint recycling plastics

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General comments

Shubhankar Kulkarni

Shubhankar Kulkarni2 years ago

This has been done in my city. The plastic mixed with liquid tar is called "polymer-modified bitumen". Apart from reducing plastic waste, road construction, this way, is cheaper, they say. Even the maintenance cost is low and the durability is high (no repairing for at least five years). In all, the plastic-tar roads are 25% better than regular roads and almost 200% more resistant to soaking up water.

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Contrived _voice

Contrived _voice2 years ago

polymer-modified bitumen is great for the environment but bitumen is still a product of fossil fuels and Its production leaves a carbon footprint too. I proposed a substitute that eliminated them and used purely reconstructed plastics reducing the effect on the planet . Aside from that, plastics have a limit to how many times they can be recycled before they lose utility. Reconstructing it to a permanent form that replaces a more carbon emissive form is a generally better solution for the environment.

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Darryl Koh Yuan Jie

Darryl Koh Yuan Jie2 years ago

This is a great idea to combat issues like pollution and global warming! I am not a science whiz kid but I am just wondering on the practicality of this idea. On the applications of Polyamidemides in the link you provided, currently on the market, it is mostly used for machinery parts due to their high price. Is there a reason why no one has come up with such an idea of using it for building roads yet?
I understand adding in plastic will reduce the total cost required, however I was wondering if the process of "breaking up the appropriate polymers" as you mentioned would itself require a lot of energy and resources to do so. From my understanding, it isn't that simple. Just curious!(Sorry I am unable to read the full text of the last journal that you linked).

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Contrived _voice

Contrived _voice2 years ago

Darryl Koh Yuan Jie It's ok..I hit the same wall..The breaking up process is great but i'ts small scale and I couldn't find exact prices..I was betting on the economies of scale lowering the price of the entire process .In summary the journal just talked about how they reassembled the monomers by reconjugating aromatic diamines after chemically separating them from thier original polymers.

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Darryl Koh Yuan Jie

Darryl Koh Yuan Jie2 years ago

Contrived _voice Ah I see. Perhaps, in the near future, the production process of such polyamide-imides can be streamlined thus cutting cost and increasing the effeciency of its formation!

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