Scientists have found a new way to turn waste like plastic, paper, and food scraps into useful fuel.
This breakthrough could help reduce pollution while creating valuable chemicals and energy.
Researchers from The Ohio State University have developed a method called chemical looping, which efficiently converts waste into syngas—a fuel used to make products like methanol and formaldehyde.
Their study was published in the journal Energy & Fuels.
Using computer simulations, the researchers tested how well their chemical looping system could break down waste.
They found it produced high-quality syngas faster and more efficiently than other chemical processes.
This means the process requires less energy and is better for the environment, according to Ishani Karki Kudva, the study’s lead author and a PhD student in chemical engineering at Ohio State.
“Syngas is an important chemical in our daily lives,” Kudva explained. “By improving its purity, we can use it in new and better ways.”
Most industrial methods today create syngas that is 80–85% pure, but this new technique achieved 90% purity in just a few minutes.
This research builds on decades of work by Liang-Shih Fan, a professor at Ohio State.
His previous studies used chemical looping to turn coal, natural gas, and even sewage gas into useful chemicals and fuels.
The new system includes two key parts:
- A moving bed reducer, where waste is broken down using oxygen from metal oxides.
- A fluidized bed combustor, which restores the lost oxygen so the metal oxides can be reused.
Thanks to this design, the process is 45% more efficient and produces 10% cleaner syngas than older methods.
According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), in 2018, the U.S. produced 35.7 million tons of plastic waste. About 12% of that came from common household items like containers, bags, appliances, furniture, and food packaging.
Since plastics take hundreds of years to break down in nature, traditional waste management methods like landfills and incineration create serious environmental problems. This new technology offers a cleaner alternative, significantly cutting carbon emissions by up to 45% compared to current waste processing methods.
The research team hopes their work will reduce society’s dependence on fossil fuels. Shekhar Shinde, a co-author of the study, says there is a major shift happening in the chemical industry toward cleaner, more sustainable technologies.
Their chemical looping system can process different types of waste at the same time, making it more flexible than older methods that required separating materials first. The next step is testing the system on a larger scale and including waste from recycling centers.
“We are working to commercialize this technology and help decarbonize the industry,” Kudva said.
If successful, this breakthrough could turn everyday waste into fuel, making the world cleaner and less dependent on fossil fuels.
