Effective catalysis of poly(ethylene terephthalate) (PET) degradation by metallic acetate ionic liquids

✍ Scribed by Zhou, Xueyuan; Lu, Xingmei; Wang, Qian; Zhu, Minli; Li, Zengxi

• Book ID: 120198109
• Publisher: International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry
• Year: 2012
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 542 KB
• Volume: 84
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0033-4545
• DOI: 10.1351/PAC-CON-11-06-10

✦ Synopsis

Poly(ethylene terephthalate) (PET) is widely used for beverage bottles, electrical and electronic instruments, household wares, and so on. As a consequence of dramatically increasing consumption, recycling of post-consumer PET products has become an important environmental opportunity for sustainable usage in society. In this paper, we investigated the use of chlorine-free metallic acetate ionic liquids (ILs) as catalysts for the degradation of PET because of their lower toxicity, corrosivity, and cost. 1,3-Diethylimidazolium triaceticzincate ([deim][Zn(OAc)~3~]) behaved as the best in this group. The synthesized ILs and the major product, characterized by a variety of techniques and factors affecting glycolysis, were examined. Under optimum conditions, conversion of PET reached 98.05 %, and the selectivity of the bis(hydroxyethyl) terephthalate (BHET) monomer was 70.94 %. A probable mechanism for the glycolysis of PET catalyzed by [deim][Zn(OAc)~3~] was given. In our opinion, catalysis accounted for the synergic effect of the cation and anion of the IL.