Characterisation of Waste plastic oil by Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy and Gas Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry

Abstract

Plastics is an essential part in today’s world due to their lightweight, enduringness, faster rate of production and design flexibility. At the corresponding time, waste plastics have created very real environmental challenges due to their immense quantities and disposal problems. Pyrolysis process is an advisable method for converting waste plastics into waste plastic oil (WPO) because of their advantages such as high conversion output, independent feedstock, low pressure operation and least amount of waste produced. GC-MS of WPO contains longer hydrocarbon chains which depicts the burning quality of fuel. No formation of highly toxic poly aromatic hydrocarbon chains was found, such as carcinogens, mutagens and teratogens in the WPO. FTIR spectrum of WPO, the presence of alkenes and alkanes is detected at 3074.59 cm^-1 & 2890.59 cm^-1 with simple C-H stretching vibrations. The existence of ketones is noticed at 1713.78 cm^-1 with C=O stretching vibrations. C=C stretching vibrations at 1652.06 cm^-1 indicates the existence of alkenes. The components present in the waste plastic oil are mostly, the aliphatic hydrocarbons (alkanes and alkenes) with carbon number C10 - C25.