Waste material

Globally, 90% of plastics are synthetic, made up of crude oil, natural gas, and coal. Even though plastic is extremely useful in our lives, its excessive use and mismanaged disposal are negatively affecting the ecosystem. The review highlights that the recycling process plays a critical role in controlling the problem of plastic pollution. Although plastic recycling is the most common approach used for managing plastic waste, only 2% of the total plastic waste enters the closed-loop system. However, the review suggests that along with recycling, cost-effective and environmentally friendly plastic approaches can synergistically help to control this increasing problem of plastic waste accumulation...

Greater Cairo, the largest megacity of the Middle East North Africa (MENA) region, is currently suffering from major aerosol pollution, posing a significant threat to public health. However, the main sources of pollution remain insufficiently characterized due to limited atmospheric observations. To bridge this knowledge gap, we conducted a continuous 2-month field study during the winter of 2019-2020 at an urban background site, documenting for the first time the chemical and physical properties of submicron (PM1 ) aerosols...

Secondary alumina dross (SAD) has emerged as an alternative to bauxite in the production of flash setting admixtures (FSA), a critical admixture in shotcrete. However, the presence of hazardous components has hampered its large-scale adoption. This study conducted field tests at an FSA factory, utilizing SAD as the primary raw material, to evaluate the feasibility and environmental risks. The results confirmed that SAD can effectively replace bauxite in FSA production without compromising quality, as it closely resembled the chemical properties of bauxite...

Food loss and waste (FLW) comes with significant environmental impacts and thus prevents a sustainable food system transition. Here we conducted a systematic review of 174 screened studies that assessed the environmental impacts of FLW generation and treatment. We found that the embodied impacts of FLW along the supply chain and impacts from FLW treatment received equal attention, but few studies have included both. The reviewed studies show narrow geographical (mostly conducted in industrialized countries) and food supply chain (mostly focused on the consumption stage) coverage...

Transition and rare earth metals serve as indispensable raw materials across a broad spectrum of technological applications. However, their utilization is frequently linked to substantial waste production. Consequently, the recycling and recovery of these metals from end-of-life products or metal-contaminated aqueous environments hold significant importance within the framework of a circular economy. In our investigation, we employed synthetic mesoporous silica monoliths, synthesized via the sol-gel method and functionalized with chelating groups, for the efficient recovery of metal ions from aqueous matrices...

Due to the potential harm to human health, heavy metal deposition in agricultural products has gained importance throughout the world. Excessive use of agrochemicals and poultry wastes dramatically increased during the cultivation processes of rapidly growing vegetables without maintaining authorized guidelines. It happens due to the availability and low cost of these materials and higher production of the vegetables. Higher levels of heavy metals, especially Arsenic (As), Lead (Pb), Chromium (Cr), and Cadmium (Cd) contamination in food have detrimental effects on human health as well as the environmental ecosystems...

Banana pseudo-stem, often considered as an underutilized plant part was explored as a potential reinforced material to develop an eco-friendly biofilm for food packaging applications. In this study, Microcrystalline cellulose (MCC) was extracted from banana pseudo-stem by alkali and acid hydrolysis treatment. The extracted MCC was used as a reinforced material in different concentrated polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) matrix alone as well as both PVA and Carboxymethyl Cellulose (CMC) matrix to develop biofilm by solvent casting method...

The increasing depletion of reserves of natural resources has led to a growing worldwide focus on the exploitation of available waste in new domains. The presence of weedy plants is pervasive on a global scale and has detrimental effects on several aspects of the environment, agriculture, and people's health. Therefore, repurposing these Agri-weed plants for beneficial purposes would be a significant achievement. Furthermore, since raw materials constitute a substantial portion of manufacturing costs, using weeds as a feasible substitute for raw materials might potentially provide considerable advantages for manufacturers...

Sustainability of a product or device is currently primarily related to its environmental footprint. Here, a wider concept of sustainability is introduced for medical devices and their components in healthcare provision. Such devices sustain healthcare and patient wellbeing due to their quality specifications for material composition, product design and performance. The term quality must be intended in the most comprehensive term, including purity and biocompatibility of materials, device reliability, limited number of recalls and reduced risks as well as acceptability for patients...

The coordinated development of intelligence and greening is an intrinsic demand for high-quality economic and social development. Intelligentization and greening are the leading directions of sustainable development of the power industry. This paper directs of sustainable development of the power industry. This paper empirically analyzes the effect and mechanism of intelligence on the green environmental friendliness of electric power substations by using a panel fixed-effects model and instrumental variable regression, using substation engineering data from China southern power grid during 2013-2022...

Nanocellulose is a kind of renewable natural polymer material with high specific surface area, high crystallinity, and strong mechanical properties. RC nanofibers (RCNFs) have attracted an increasing attention in various applications due to their high aspect ratio and good flexibility. Herein, a novel and facile strategy for RCNFs preparation with high-speed shear induced in urea solution through "bottom-up" approach was proposed in this work. Results indicated that the average diameter and yield of RCNF was approach to 136...

The development of modern construction and transportation industries demands increasingly high requirements for thin, lightweight, high-strength, and highly tough composite materials, such as metal carbides and concrete. Bamboo is a green, low-carbon, fast-growing, renewable, and biodegradable material with high strength and toughness. However, the density of its inner layer is low due to the functional gradient (the volume fraction of vascular bundles decreases from the outer layer to the inner layer), resulting in low performance, high compressibility, and significant amounts of bamboo waste...

Biofouling is a serious challenge for global salmon aquaculture and farmers have to regularly clean pen nets to avoid impacts on stock health and farms' structural integrity. The removed material is released into the surrounding environment. This includes cnidarian species such as hydroids, whose nematocyst-bearing fragments can impact gill health and fish welfare. There is also increasing evidence of the association of parasites and pathogens with biofouling organisms and cleaning fragments. It is unknown whether and how far local current regimes disperse biofouling material and whether this material reaches and interacts with adjacent pens or even neighbouring farms downstream, or wild fish populations in surrounding environments...

In this work, we report a supercapacitor electrode material based on nano-flower like cobalt molybdate decorated on porous activated carbon derived from waste onion peels (β-CoMoO4 -POAC). The obtained porous activated carbon derived from onion peels (POAC), exhibits highly porous structure and after the hydrothermal treatment with salts of cobalt and molybdenum, we observed a uniform distribution of β-cobalt molybdate (β-CoMoO4 ) as nano-flowers on the surface of POAC. The chemical composition, morphology and porosity of the materials were thoroughly analyzed using field emission scanning electron microscopy, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction, infrared spectroscopy and Brunauer-Emmet-Teller surface area measurement...

Plastic products have gained global popularity due to their lightweight, excellent ductility, high durability, and portability. However, out of the 8.3 billion tons of plastic waste generated by human activities, 80% of plastic waste is discarded due to improper disposal, and then transformed into microplastic pollution under the combined influence of environmental factors and microorganisms. In this comprehensive study, we present a thorough review of recent advancements in research on the source, distribution, and effect of microplastics...

Geosynthetic clay liners (GCLs) are mostly used as flow barriers in landfills and waste containments due to their low hydraulic conductivity to prevent the leachate from reaching the environment. The self-healing and swell-shrink properties of soft clays (expansive soils) such as bentonite enable them as promising materials for the GCL core layers. However, it is important to modify their physico-chemical properties in order to overcome the functional limitations of GCL under different hydraulic conditions...

Sustainability of a medical device has not yet become a major issue in public discussions compared to other topics with impact to material performance, clinical application, production economy and environmental pollution. Due to their unique properties, polymers (plastics) allow for multiple, flexible applications in medical device technology. Polymers are part of the majority of disposable and single use medical device and contribute with 3% to the worldwide production of plastics. The global medical polymer market size was valued 19...

Lithium-carbon dioxide (Li-CO2 ) batteries offer the possibility of synchronous implementation of carbon neutrality and the development of advanced energy storage devices. The exploration of low-cost and efficient cathode catalysts is key to the improvement of Li-CO2 batteries. Herein, high-entropy alloys (HEAs)@C hierarchical nanosheet is synthesized from the simulation of the recycling solution of waste batteries to construct a cathode for the first time. Owing to the excellent electrical conductivity of the carbon material, the unique high-entropy effect of the HEAs, and the large number of catalytically active sites exposed by the hierarchical structure, the FeCoNiMnCuAl@C-based battery exhibits a superior discharge capability of 27664 mAh g-1 and outstanding durability of 134 cycles as well as low overpotential with 1...

The strong demand for biological materials in the food industry places chitosan at the forefront of other biopolymers. The present study aims to evaluate the antifungal properties of chitosan extracted from shrimp shell waste ( Parapenaeus longirostris ) against post-harvest strawberry ( Fragaria × ananassa ) spoilage fungi. The physicochemical characteristics (DD, Mw, and solubility) of extracted chitosan were determined. In addition, functional characteristics were studied by Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), X-ray diffraction (XRD), and scanning electron microscopy (SEM)...

Tetrahedrite (Cu12 Sb4 S13 ) is an earth-abundant and nontoxic compound with prospective applications in green energy technologies such as thermoelectric waste heat recycling or photovoltaic power generation. A facile, one-pot solution-phase modified polyol method has been developed that produces high-purity nanoscale tetrahedrite products with exceptional stoichiometric and phase control. This modified polyol method is used here to produce phase-pure quaternary and quintenary tetrahedrite nanoparticles doped on the Cu-site with Zn, Fe, Ni, Mn, or Co...