title: Boiling treatment of ABS and PS plastics for flotation separation.
abstract: A new physical method, namely boiling treatment, was developed to aid flotation separation of acrylonitrile-butadiene-styrene (ABS) and polystyrene (PS) plastics. Boiling treatment was shown to be effective in producing a hydrophilic surface on ABS plastic. Fourier Transform Infrared analysis was conducted to investigate the mechanism of boiling treatment of ABS. Surface rearrangement of polymer may be responsible for surface change of boiling treated ABS, and the selective influence of boiling treatment on the floatability of boiling treated plastics may be attributed to the difference in the molecular mobility of polymer chains. The effects of flotation time, frother concentration and particle size on flotation behavior of simple plastic were investigated. Based on flotation behavior of simple plastic, flotation separation of boiling treatment ABS and PS with different particle sizes was achieved efficiently. The purity of ABS and PS was up to 99.78% and 95.80%, respectively; the recovery of ABS and PS was up to 95.81% and 99.82%, respectively. Boiling treatment promotes the industrial application of plastics flotation and facilitates plastic recycling.
authors.affiliation: School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Key Laboratory of Resources Chemistry of Nonferrous Metals, Ministry of Education, Central South University, Changsha, 410083 Hunan, China.
authors.forename: Chong-qing
authors.initials: CQ
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.affiliation: School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Key Laboratory of Resources Chemistry of Nonferrous Metals, Ministry of Education, Central South University, Changsha, 410083 Hunan, China. Electronic address: huiwang1968@163.com.
authors.forename: Hui
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.affiliation: School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Key Laboratory of Resources Chemistry of Nonferrous Metals, Ministry of Education, Central South University, Changsha, 410083 Hunan, China.
authors.forename: Bao-xin
authors.initials: BX
authors.lastname: Wu
authors.affiliation: School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Key Laboratory of Resources Chemistry of Nonferrous Metals, Ministry of Education, Central South University, Changsha, 410083 Hunan, China.
authors.forename: Qun
authors.initials: Q
authors.lastname: Liu
mesh_terms: D000180:Acrylic Resins / Q000737:chemistry*; D002070:Butadienes / Q000737:chemistry*; D057927:Hydrophobic and Hydrophilic Interactions; D010316:Particle Size; D011108:Polymers / Q000737:chemistry*; D011137:Polystyrenes / Q000737:chemistry*; D059027:Recycling; D012037:Refuse Disposal / Q000379:methods*
chemical_list: D000180:Acrylic Resins; D002070:Butadienes; D011108:Polymers; D011137:Polystyrenes; C024636:ABS resin
keywords: Boiling treatment; Flotation separation; Surface rearrangement; Waste plastics