Recent advances in chemical recycling of polyethylene terephthalate waste into value added products for sustainable coating solutions – hope vs. hype

Abstract

In the current era of globalization, plastics are an indispensable part of our daily life; from our morning toothbrush to night dinner table, plastics are everywhere in our daily life. In such a polymer governing era, the problems related to their pollution are inevitable as most of the commercially used synthetic plastics are non-biodegradable in nature. Among these non-biodegradable polymers, polyethylene terephthalate (PET) constitutes a significant percentage due to its widespread application in the packaging, food and beverage, and automotive industries. This ever-increasing application of PET generates a large volume of post-consumer waste materials which have to be dumped in most of the cases after a certain time. However, with growing environmental awareness, the recycling of polymeric waste materials into valuable ones has become one of the hot topics in mainstream research. There are already a few research articles where researchers have demonstrated that these polymeric waste material derived products can be used further to synthesize new polymeric materials which have applications in various sectors (such as in the fields of regenerative medicine and organic coatings). From this point of view, here we have summarized the recent progress in recycling of PET waste into value-added products and their subsequent utilization in the field of organic coatings. In addition to that we have reviewed, all the major research studies carried out in chemical recycling of PET waste across the globe which can be later used in the coating industry. The review also highlights the existing challenges in this field involved with upscaling of these processes in industry. Additionally, we have predicted future directions on how these recycled products can be used in a sustainable and economically feasible way, so that this can reduce the carbon footprint significantly and help in achieving a closed-loop circular economy.