Issue 3, 2024
From the journal:

Green Chemistry

Recycling of polyurethanes: where we are and where we are going

Gabriele Rossignolo,a   Giulio Malucelli ORCID logo *b  and  Alessandra Lorenzetti ORCID logo a  

* Corresponding authors

a Università di Padova, Dept. of Industrial Engineering, Via F. Marzolo 9, 35131 Padova, Italy

b Politecnico di Torino Dept. of Applied Science and Technology, Viale Teresa Michel 5, 15121 Alessandria, Italy
E-mail: giulio.malucelli@polito.it

Abstract

Polyurethanes (PUs) represent a family of useful synthetic polymers (thermoplastic or thermosetting) obtained from diisocyanates and diols/polyols via polycondensation reactions. Within the circular economy concept and also considering the current need for limiting the environmental impact of plastics, several methods have been designed, assessed, and exploited for the recovery at the end-of-life of polyurethanes and for their recycling. Indeed, the processing of polyurethane wastes can be significantly beneficial not only from an ecological but also from an economic point of view. At present, feedstock (namely, glycolysis) and mechanical recycling are the two most important strategies to recover and recycle polyurethanes; notwithstanding, “biological recycling”, an approach that exploits the biological degradation of the polymer, is gaining interest. This review aims to elucidate the recycling processes of both thermoplastic and thermosetting polyurethanes, providing the reader with some perspectives about their possible future developments.

Graphical abstract: Recycling of polyurethanes: where we are and where we are going

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Article information

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1039/D3GC02091F
Article type
Tutorial Review
Submitted
13 Jun 2023
Accepted
05 Dec 2023
First published
19 Dec 2023
This article is Open Access
Creative Commons BY-NC license

Green Chem., 2024,26, 1132-1152

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Recycling of polyurethanes: where we are and where we are going

G. Rossignolo, G. Malucelli and A. Lorenzetti, Green Chem., 2024, 26, 1132 DOI: 10.1039/D3GC02091F

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