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Plastics From Potato Waste
| Article
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19344 |
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Section : |
NATURAL SCIENCE
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| Issue
Date : |
6 / 1991 |
1,241 Words |
| Author
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Robert Coleman
Robert Coleman is the microbiology section leader at Argonne
National Laboratory in Argonne, Illinois. |
The disparate worlds of potatoes and plastics may hold a solution to each other's problems.
Waste from potato processing adds up to more than 10 billion pounds annually in the United States alone. The total is growing, overloading present methods of disposal.
The nondegradable plastic waste fouling the environment--a more visible problem--is stimulating a rising demand for degradable plastics. Furthermore, the heightened awareness that plastics are made from a nonrenewable resource, petroleum, provides impetus for finding a way to make plastics from renewable sources.
While research into biodegradable plastics is proceeding on many fronts, one of the most promising approaches may be the one now being mastered at Argonne National Laboratory, in Argonne, Illinois. In concept, the idea is simple: convert potato starch into a biodegradable plastic that can be made photodegradable, with the rate of degradation being determined during the production process.
A potentially valuable resource, food processing waste has become an economic burden and a serious environmental problem. Although some potato waste is sold as cattle feed or converted to ethanol as an alternative to gasoline, billions of pounds of it are spread on land dedicated to that use alone. Each year, cheese producers generate several billion pounds of cheese whey wastes, a potentially valuable source of energy-rich molecules. Other food processing industries generate large quantities of energy-rich wastes as well.
Sine June 1988, researchers at Argonne have been developing a process for turning starchy food waste into plastics that are fully biodegradable and can readily be made photodegradable. Nearing mastery of the complete process, Argonne's researchers are developing technology that (1) converts food processing waste into lactic acid, and (2) uses polylactic acid (chains of lactic acid molecules) to make environmentally safe, degradable plastics. The research and development required to produce degradable plastics from high-carbohydrate food waste is multidisciplinary, drawing on expertise in enzymology, molecular, biology, microbiology, fermentation, product recovery, process design, and polymer chemistry.
Biodegradable polylactic acid plastics have been in use for some years. However, they are expensive and are used only to make high-value items such as surgical sutures,
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