Catalytic and Hydrocracking of Waste Plastics to High Quality Liquid Fuels

Plastics are widely used in our day-to-day life. Heaps of wastes around us generated by these materials lead to considerable environmental problems. Recycling the waste plastics is one way to remove the waste and to utilize the material for useful purposes. Catalytic cracking and hydrocracking are processes in which waste plastics are cracked (converted to smaller chain molecules) in the presence of a catalyst. The product of these cracking processes is a mixture of fuels such as gasoline and diesel. This way, not only, the waste material is removed but the energy present in the material is also recovered in the form of liquid fuels of high value. In the present research, the search for suitable well characterized catalysts along with the desired operating conditions for catalytic and hydrocracking of waste plastics that produce the best range of fuel products will be carried out. Moreover, the waste plastics will probably be mixed with low value oil residues (refinery products) and even coal and cracked to consume the low cost and low value materials and to produce valuable range of fuel products. The success of the project may lead to inception of commercial units in the sultanate.