{"id":4867,"date":"2014-12-15T07:02:02","date_gmt":"2014-12-14T21:02:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.privatefleet.com.au\/?p=4867"},"modified":"2020-06-20T01:16:15","modified_gmt":"2020-06-19T15:16:15","slug":"turning-plastic-back-into-oil","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.privatefleet.com.au\/blog\/fuel-2\/turning-plastic-back-into-oil\/","title":{"rendered":"Turning Plastic Back Into Oil?"},"content":{"rendered":"

International experts in the area of renewable technology believe that when a society reaches a certain level of affluence, they start to demand better and more technologies that are sustainable and\/or renewable.\u00a0 We\u2019ve seen this over the years in the automotive industry.\u00a0 About ten years ago, hardly any car companies had hybrid vehicle and all the really upmarket vehicles were all about power and big gas-guzzling engines.\u00a0 Today, however, nearly every manufacturer has at least one hybrid in the lineup \u2013 and these hybrids aren\u2019t snail-paced little dinkies. To take one example, Audi has added the e-tron plug-in hybrid <\/a>to its already popular luxury A3 line.\u00a0 This hybrid certainly isn\u2019t a slug!<\/p>\n

\"plastic2petrol\"<\/a>Cars that use little or no fuel (if the electricity was generated using a renewable source like hydro) are one part of the sustainable motoring equation. Finding alternative sources of fuel that don\u2019t rely on crude oil that (a) is going to run out eventually and (b) comes from politically volatile nations is the other.\u00a0 We\u2019ve discussed a few of these in the past \u2013 algae biodiesel, ethanol, jatropha and the like \u2013 and we\u2019ve now found another great development.<\/p>\n

The stuff we put in our cars so they chug along from A to B isn\u2019t the only thing that comes from crude oil.\u00a0 The other major use is plastic.\u00a0 Now, plastic was developed at about the same time as the internal combustion engine (Bakelite was invented in the 1850s) and really took off in about the 1950s.\u00a0 And we all know how it\u2019s taken over since then and we\u2019re forever tripping over the ruddy stuff on the beach, etc. etc.\u00a0 I could easily go off into a rant about plastic shopping bags and how we need to go back to paper bags instead but I\u2019d better stay on topic.<\/p>\n

Plastic is made from oil.\u00a0 Theoretically, then, it should be possible to \u201cunrefine\u201d it and turn it back into oil.\u00a0 This is exactly what one Japanese inventor has managed to do.\u00a0 Akinori Ito, founder of a company called Blest, has come up with a machine that will do exactly that.\u00a0 This machine isn\u2019t some massive monster of a factory plant, either.\u00a0 It\u2019s small enough to fit into the average garage and can convert polystyrene, polyethylene and polypropylene back into crude gas.\u00a0 This gas can\u2019t be poured straight into your vehicle\u2019s fuel tank (although it can be used in some generators), as it needs further refining before it\u2019s OK for that.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s pretty efficient, too. It can take 1 kg of plastic and turn it into about 1 litre of crude.\u00a0 The machine is powered by electricity and the process of turning the kilo of plastic into the litre of crude takes 1 kW\/h of electricity.\u00a0 It does produce some residue that is, according to (a) the manufacturers and (b) Japanese regulations, burnable.\u00a0 The process also produces a few greenhouse gases (methane, ethane, propane and butane) but the latest refinements contain a gas filter that breaks these gases down into CO2<\/sub> and water.<\/p>\n

The real beauty about this machine is that although it doesn\u2019t convert all plastics to oil, it does deal with some of the most common ones \u2013 the sort of thing that most of us have sitting in our rubbish or recycling bins.\u00a0 Here\u2019s a little exercise that you can try once you\u2019ve finished reading this:\u00a0 Go to your rubbish bin and\/or recycling crate and pick out the polypropylene, the polyethylene and the polystyrene.\u00a0 Weigh it.\u00a0 Every kilo adds up to a litre of fuel.<\/p>\n