Turning Plastic Waste Into Carbon Nanotubes

Welsh-based startup TrimTabs has developed an innovative process to upcycle waste polymers into a light, super-strong composite material with applications in the energy storage and transmission, automotive, construction, electronics, medical and aerospace industries.

Trim Tabs leadership team: David Ryan and Professor Alvin Orbaek White

Plastic waste is a growing global challenge, with millions of tonnes disposed of every year. It is perhaps the most totemic waste problem of our age. Despite increasing efforts to improve recycling rates, many types of plastic remain difficult or uneconomical to recycle, demanding innovative solutions.

One company taking a novel approach to this is TrimTabs, a UK-based startup that has developed a process to turn plastic waste into high-value carbon nanotubes. By harnessing the inherent value in discarded plastics, TrimTabs aims to commercialise a new option for the circular economy, addressing the environmental burden of some waste plastics.

The potential applications using carbon nanotubes are vast, from enhancing the performance of lithium-ion batteries to creating stronger, lighter composites for industries like aerospace and automotive. The use of nanotubes in electronic components, solar cells, and water filtration systems also holds significant promise.

The idea behind TrimTabs originated with founder and CEO Prof. Alvin Orbaek White, whose background spans physics, chemistry, mechanical engineering, and chemical engineering. "I was working on a Ph.D. program in Barcelona, where we were making a device that will go to the moon and turn lunar regolith, moon soil, into solar cells and breathing oxygen," Prof. Orbaek White explains. "In order to do that, in space physics, you really need robust, lightweight materials that have long durability. And there was one critical material that was capable of doing this - carbon nanotubes."

Prof. Orbaek White's fascination with carbon nanotubes led him to Rice University, where he was inspired by the late Professor Richard Smalley, a Nobel laureate for his work on buckminsterfullerene (soccer ball-shaped carbon molecule). Under the supervision of Professor Andrew Baron "I learned to make carbon nanotubes and was just totally enamoured by them," Orbaek White recalls. "They're light like ash but have tensile strength 100 times greater than steel. So I thought to myself, this is a magic material."

It was during a meeting with the Welsh Government about opportunities in India that Orbaek White considered moving forward on his ideas about the potential for using waste plastics as a feedstock to produce carbon nanotubes. "I knew instinctively as a chemist that plastics can be a very viable source of carbon for making carbon nanotubes, but I didn't have the data."

source:Trim Tabs