Experimental and Computational Electrochemistry to Move Toward Plastics Circularity

Abstract

This thesis work is grounded primarily in the goal of leveraging the potent yet fine tunable nature of an electrochemical driving force to tackle key issues in augmenting the chemical recyclability of plastics, namely the synthesis of plastic monomers and the deconstruction of existing plastics. Increasing plastic circularity will be crucial in decarbonizing the 400 Mt of plastic generated annually and the associated climate and environmental effects that result from producing plastics on this scale. While the key chemical reaction involved in the synthesis of plastics is the polymerization of monomers, the goal of this thesis is to demonstrate that electrochemistry – both experimental and computational – has a role to play in the synthesis of novel plastic monomers in addition to allowing for new potential decomposition pathways for the plastics in use today. This thesis can be broken down into three parts: (1) the experimental demonstration of sustainable synthesis of circular monomers using electrochemistry (2) the computational study of organic redox mediators with the potential for polystyrene deconstruction (3) and the implementation of data driven models to improve the throughput of computational screening.