Plastic bottles, car parts, made from sugar? Yes, says DowDuPont

[TexasTowelie]

DowDuPont scientists are racing to commercialize a plastic that is derived from sugar and not crude oil – an innovation that could be a key win for the conglomerate's forthcoming Delaware spinoff.

They have developed a "revolutionary" process to construct a spaghetti-like molecular chain that can be formed into soda bottles, car parts and even polyester fabric, said Wilmington-based chemist Paul Fagan, who leads the company's research into sustainable polymers.

The renewable molecules come from corn and sugar cane and have a less harmful impact on the environment because their production results in lower carbon emissions than that of petroleum plastics, Fagan said.

And, unlike oil, sugars will never run out, he said.

“A lot of our customers and, we ourselves, would like to get away from using oil to make things," said Fagan, a precise-speaking scientist with more than 20 patents to his name. “We’re not only trying to make things sustainable but also ... recyclable at the same time, that’s the advantage of the particular class of polymers I’m working on now."

Read more: http://www.delawareonline.com/story/money/business/2017/11/21/new-dowdupont-plastic-could-revolutionize-industry/859654001/

[Throck]

1. Both are carbon based molecules.

This is great news.

Sugar is bad for the diet but now could possibly be used for (hopefully) useful consumer products. Good for the agricultural economy as well.

[Wounded Bear]

2. Sounds good to me...

Any way to get away from extractive industries sounds great.

Fossil fuels and their derivitives have to be replaced with less toxic materials.

[eppur_se_muova]

3. Cellulose -- whose fibers form cotton and paper -- is just a polymer of glucose.

Add lignin, and you've got wood. So, yeah, sugar has been forming structural polymers for billions of years. I haven't seen anyone turning corn syrup into cotton fibers or paper yet, though.

Buried in the article is a reference to the product, "furandicarboxylic acid dimethyl ester". The temptation to use this as a substitute for the petroleum-derived terephthalate, precursor to PETE -- used to make Dacron, Mylar, Terylene, soft drink bottles, and fiberglass-reinforced car bodies and high-pressure gas cylinders, is obvious from its shape.

The chemistry involved is presumably related to that in Molisch's test for carbohydrates, which involves dehydration to form hydroxymethylfurfural. Subsequent oxidation (requiring only air and a catalyst) would give furandicarboxylate. People have been working on this reaction for a long time -- the problem is its inefficiency, which results in the formation of abundant byproducts. Similar reactions can be carried out with oxidized sugar acids, but these tend to lead to other products. A similar reaction of pentoses has long been used to make furfural, one of the oldest renewable feedstocks.

[jmowreader]

4. I want to be reincarnated as a chemist

I wonder if it’s possible to create a reusable reagent that’d convert coal into CO and CH4 (from which you can make anything you want) without using a ton of energy as you go? The sugar-to-plastic process sounds neat, but if you thought the screaming when we started making fuel out of corn was bad, wait til we make plastic out of it.