Bioplastics are biodegradable plastics made from biological substances rather than petroleum.
The novel approach involves a 'plug-in' preconditioning process, a simple adjustment for biofuel refineries, said Joshua Yuan, a research scientist at the Texas A&M AgriLife Research facility. These 'plug-in' technologies allow for optimisation of sustainable, cost-effective lignin – the key component of bioplastics used in food packaging and other everyday items.
According to Yuan, efficient extraction and use of lignin is a major challenge for biofuel refineries. “Our process takes five conventional pre-treatment technologies and modifies them to produce biofuel and plastics together at a lower cost,” he explained.
The new method, called 'plug-in preconditioning processes of lignin', or PIPOL, can be added into current bio-refineries and is not cost-prohibitive, Yuan said. PIPOL is designed to integrate dissolving, conditioning, and fermenting...