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It’s piled up in landfills. It clutters fields and rivers, dangles from trees, and forms flotillas of waste in the seas. China’s use of plastic bags, containers and cutlery has become one of its most stubborn and ugliest environmental blights. Actions to Drastically Reduce Use of Disposable Plastic Items So the Chinese government has introduced measures to drastically cut the amount of disposable plastic items that often become a hazard and an eyesore in the country, even deep in the countryside and in the oceans. Among the new guidelines are bans on the import of plastic waste and the use of nonbiodegradable plastic bags in major cities by the end of this year. Other sources of plastic garbage will be banned in Beijing, Shanghai and wealthy coastal provinces by the end of 2022, and that rule will extend nationwide by late 2025. Serious and Systematic Efforts Previous efforts to reduce the use of plastic bags have faltered in China, but the government has indicated

ETH researchers have created an incredibly lightweight 18-carat gold, using a matrix of plastic in place of metallic alloy elements. Leonie van ’t Hag has set to create a new form of gold that weighs about five to ten times less than traditional 18-carat gold.  The conventional mixture is usually three-quarters gold and one-quarter copper, with a density of about 15 g/cm 3 . That’s not true for this new lightweight gold, its density is just 1.7 g/cm 3 . And nonetheless it is still 18-carat gold.  Light Weighting Gold Using Polymer Latex Instead of a metal alloy element, van ’t Hag, Mezzenga and colleagues used protein fibers and a polymer latex to form a matrix in which they embedded thin discs of gold nanocrystals. In addition, the lightweight gold contains countless tiny air pockets invisible to the eye. Gold platelets and plastic melt into a material that can be easily processed mechanically. The Process to Develop the New Gold They added the ingredients to water an

A new Stanford study shows mealworms can eat Styrofoam containing a common toxic chemical additive and still can be safely used as a protein-rich feedstock for other animals. Natural Breakdown of Chemicals in Mealworm’s Gut The study is the first to look at where chemicals in plastic end up after being broken down in a natural system – a yellow mealworm’s gut, in this case. It serves as a proof of concept for deriving value from plastic waste. “ This is definitely not what we expected to see. It’s amazing that mealworms can eat a chemical additive without it building up in their body over time. ” said study lead author Anja Malawi Brandon, a PhD candidate in civil and environmental engineering at Stanford. In earlier work, Stanford researchers and collaborators at other institutions revealed that mealworms, which are easy to cultivate and widely used as a food for animals ranging from chickens and snakes to fish and shrimp, can subsist on a diet of various types of plastic. “

In a major step towards making India a natural gas-based economy and making CNG as the eco-friendly option for long distance transport in the country, Shri Dharmendra Pradhan, Minister of Petroleum & Natural Gas and Steel, unveiled India’s first long distance CNG bus. Fitted with composite CNG cylinders, it can travel around 1,000 kilometers on a single fill. The project has been executed by Indraprastha Gas Limited (IGL) and has been achieved through pioneering design of Type IV Composite Cylinders in buses, replacing traditional very heavy Type-I Carbon Steel cylinders. According to Pradhan, these CNG buses are being run on a pilot test, but soon they will be scaled on commercial basis. “Delhi has witnessed revolution in shift towards cleaner, gas based fuels. Over 500 CNG stations are operating in Delhi NCR today and about 1.2 million piped natural gas connections have been provided. Long haul CNG buses originating from Delhi to other locations will further drive this shift

Covestro has announced that it is particularly focused on premium packaging materials for high value medical devices that meet increased requirements for mechanical protection, sterilization and dimensional stability. Breast implants are sensitive products that should arrive undamaged at the treating doctor or hospital after manufacture, sterilization and transport. Covestro's Makrofol® MA507 polycarbonate film is well suitable for their packaging because it is highly transparent and allows the physician to reliably visually inspect the implant before unpacking it. It also provides stable protection for the valuable medical device. The comparable product Makrofol® MA336 offers the same advantages, but also features a laminating film on it. Both films are characterized by high tear and impact resistance. They can be easily thermoformed and are fully compatible with the demanding autoclave sterilization process, where they need to withstand temperatures of up to 163 degrees

SGL Carbon  and the Hyundai Motor Group have announced an agreement on an early extension to the existing supply agreement for fuel cell components. The long-term agreement provides now for a substantial ramp-up of current production and delivery volumes of gas diffusion layers for the NEXO fuel cell car to support Hyundai’s objectives in the area of fuel cell drives. The investment required to fulfill this contract will not increase the overall capital expenditure budget of SGL Carbon in the next two years, as the company has reprioritized its investment projects. Greenest Energy Technology “ The extension of the partnership with Hyundai is perfectly aligned to our strategic direction. Intelligent solutions in the area of sustainable energy are one of the key growth drivers for our company ,” explains Dr. Michael Majerus, Spokesman of the Board of Management of SGL Carbon. “ Whether used in a drive system in vehicles or as a stationary power supply, the fuel cell is one of t

A research team, jointly led by Professor Ji Wook Jang, Professor Yong Hwan Kim, and Professor Sang Hoon Joo in the School of Energy and Chemical Engineering at UNIST has unveiled a novel biomass conversion technology that can turn forestry biomass residues (i.e., sawdust from timber logging) into higher value fuels and chemicals.  Researchers Introduce Fusion Catalytic System In the study, the joint research team has introduced a fusion catalytic system that can selectively convert lignin, which forms the chief constituent of wood wastes, into higher value chemicals via solar energy. Lignin, after Cellulose, is the second most abundant renewable biopolymer found in nature and is usually discarded as waste in the pulp and paper industry in very large amounts. Unlike Cellulose, the structure of lignin is extremely complex and lacks steric regularity. Such traits make lignin hard to break down and even harder to convert into something valuable.  Biocatalysts, such as enzymes, a