A novel tandem pyrolysis-catalytic upgrading strategy for plastic waste to high-value products with zeolite and red mud

Xingwang Xi, Jin, Kun’ai, Xin Niu and Shuping Zhang

Energy, 2025, vol. 330, issue C

Abstract: This article proposed a novel tandem pyrolysis-catalytic upgrading strategy for plastic waste using ZSM-5 and red mud catalysts to produce high-value gas-liquid-solid three-phase products. After using ZSM-5 zeolite catalyst for the catalytic pyrolysis of various plastics (PE/PP/PET/PS) at 550 °C, the pyrolysis oil were collected and tested. Then, the red mud catalyst was further used to catalytic reformation of pyrolysis gas at 800 °C to obtain reforming gas and carbon materials. The obtained pyrolysis oil from tandem pyrolysis-catalytic upgrading process was in the range of 30.88–67.83 wt% with the aromatics selectivity of 73.8–94.4 area% for PE/PP/PET/PS. In addition to pyrolysis oil, PE and PP produced reforming gas rich in H2 and CH4 and carbon materials through tandem pyrolysis-catalytic upgrading process. After tandem pyrolysis-catalytic upgrading process, PET was converted into pyrolysis oil rich in 2-ring aromatics (with the selectivity of 49.5 area%) and synthesis gas rich in CO and H2. Finally, this article also revealed the reaction process of producing pyrolysis oil, pyrolysis gas, and carbon materials during the tandem pyrolysis-catalytic upgrading process of different plastics. The results demonstrated the effective utilization of both zeolite and red mud (an aluminum industry byproduct) as catalysts to achieve eco-friendly recycling of waste plastics for obtaining high-value gas-liquid-solid products, offering a practical framework for the large-scale industrial treatment of waste plastics.

Keywords: Plastics; Red mud; ZSM-5; Catalytic pyrolysis; Catalytic reformation; Carbon materials (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0360544225025630
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:energy:v:330:y:2025:i:c:s0360544225025630

DOI: 10.1016/j.energy.2025.136921

Access Statistics for this article

Energy is currently edited by Henrik Lund and Mark J. Kaiser

More articles in Energy from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().