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How to turn plastic waste into diesel fuel cheaply

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  • How to turn plastic waste into diesel fuel cheaply

    The process is really simple, it is similar to how alcohol is made. If you heat plastic waste in non oxygen environment, it will melt, but will not burn. After it has melted, it will start to boil and evaporate, you just need to put those vapors through a cooling pipe and when cooled the vapors will condense to a liquid and some of the vapors with shorter hydrocarbon lengths will remain as a gas. The exit of the cooling pipe is then going through a bubbler containing water to capture the last liquid forms of fuel and leave only gas that is then burned. If the cooling of the cooling tube is sufficient, there will be no fuel in the bubbler, but if not, the water will capture all the remaining fuel that will float above the water and can be poured off the water. On the bottom of the cooling tube is a steel reservoir that collects all the liquid and it has a release valve on the bottom so that the liquid fuel can be poured out. Here are some pictures to better understand the design:









    This device works on electricity (3 phase), it has six nichrome coils as heating elements and consumes a total of 6kW (1kW each coil). The coils are turned on and off by three solid state relays, one for each phase, the relays are controlled by a digital thermostat with a temperature sensor just a bit below the lid, so that the vapor temperature can be monitored. You need to heat the plastic slowly to about 350 degrees and just wait till it does the magic. Our device has a capacity of 50 liters and can hold about 30 kg of shredded plastic. The process takes about 4 hours, but it can be shortened considerably by tweaking the design a bit. As I said, this makes a liquid fuel that can be used as multifuel, that means it can be used on diesel engines and also on gasoline engines, but we still need to test it will work on gasoline. It works for diesel engines just fine, that has already been tested. There is a difference in what plastic you use, if you use polyethylene (plastic cans, plastic foil, and all kind of flexible non break plastics) you will get out liquid fuel that will solidify as it cools into paraffin, it is still good for diesel engines as long as you use a heated fuel tank, because it needs to be heated just about at 30 degrees celsius to be liquid and transparent. If you don't want that, you can put the paraffin through the device for one more time and you will chop those hydrocarbons even smaller and half of the paraffin will turn to liquid fuel and other half will remain a paraffin, but much denser and will melt at higher temperatures, this is the stuff you can make candles out of and it does not smell at all when burned, maybe a bit like candles. But if you use polypropylene (computer monitor cases, printer cases, other plastics that break easily), you get out only liquid fuel, no paraffin at all. All you need is just filter the fuel out of solids and you good to go and put it in your gas tank. We have made the analysis and it is almost the perfect diesel fraction. It has no acids or alkalines in it, like fuel from tires does. The unit in the pictures can convert about 60 kg of plastic into 60 liters of fuel in one day. Other methods of heating the reactor can be employed, electricity is just easier to work with and control. Some Japanese companies manufacture such devices, but their prices for this size unit is more than 100 000$, our home made device cost us 900$ max. We use aluminum oxide bricks to insulate the heat, they are light as foam and can be easily cut in any shape, but any kind of insulator can be used. The bricks make the highest costs for this device. It can also be made using liquid fuel burners to heat the reactor, this will enable to make the device self sustainable by using about 10-15% of the produced fuel along with the produced gas. A small farm can use a device this size and make fuel for itself by converting plastic waste to fuel, farms have very much plastic waste and it is a big problem, at least in my country. Our next goal is to make the same thing possible using biomass, every farm could then use old leafs, wet grass, saw dust and all kind of biomass and gasify it into tar like substance that can then be put through the pyrolysis device and turned into biodiesel. But we will see about that. Here are some fuel samples:

    These are samples from polyethylene, in the first run out comes mostly paraffin like liquid that solidifies at temperatures below 20 degrees celsius, the other clear sample is from the same paraffin that is gone through the process one more time. Will post more pictures and a video later.
    Thanks,
    Jetijs
    It's better to wear off by working than to rust by doing nothing.

  • #2
    We made calculations, it turns out that our device, as crude as it is with much room for improvement, can produce diesel fuel at a cost of 17 US cents a liter, that is when only plastic and electricity is considered. The next machine will probably use a liquid fuel burner to heat the reactor, this could lower the costs even more as it would then run on a small percentage of the produced fuel and also the produced gas would then be used more practically - burned along with the fuel to heat the reactor. Even now, if we would get the electricity from a diesel generator that runs on the produced fuel, it would consume about 20% of the produced fuel, but those generators are never efficient and much of the potential power is lost, so heating the reactor using a burner should be even more efficient. Japan produces such units that run themselves using the produced fuel, their machines use 7-10% of the yield. But they cost more than 100 000$ for a unit the size we have. We also calculated all the materials and work involved to make this device and it comes around 1200$, but it is scalable from table top units up to industrial size units that produce several tons of fuel daily.

    Here is a video I made and uploaded on a fake youtube account:
    YouTube - Easy way to make your own diesel from plastic waste
    It's better to wear off by working than to rust by doing nothing.

    Comment


    • #3
      Jetijs I have no words to describe how impressed I am with your skills.

      Everything you do is amazing. I wonder how I could learn a small fraction of what you know.

      Keep it up.

      Comment


      • #4
        Thanks bugler


        I forgot to mention that this is not entirely my project because I don't have much time for it, the work was mostly done by my friend at my shop, I just helped him. This is a very big step forward from my tire pyrolysis project few years back and it would not get this far without my friend
        All the info will be shared, nothing will be kept to us. It is time to make a change. This thing is what almost everyone can make in their garage in the scale he can afford. Sure it is not free energy, but it is a damn cheap one that you can make yourself and the best part is that you get rid of the plastic waste in the process making it environmentally friendly. Some others that are working on this tech keep every detail in secret, and Japanese units are so damn cheap that most of people decide that this is too expensive and complex to build by yourself. But it is not!
        It's better to wear off by working than to rust by doing nothing.

        Comment


        • #5
          Jetijs I was thinking that this could be an amazing final project for mechanical engineering.

          You says that all the info will be shared. When will you share it?

          I would ask to share the information in a very low level way. I mean that when highly experienced people share knowledge they don't realize how much they know so those with much lower level of knowledge don't undertand the information. As I say, please explain it for dummies like me.

          Thanks.

          Comment


          • #6
            The info is already shared, if you don't understand something or have any questions I will answer them, just ask I am aware that if you see this tech for the first time it might be confusing, but that is why I am here, to answer questions
            It's better to wear off by working than to rust by doing nothing.

            Comment


            • #7
              I attached the basic sketch of the system.
              Attached Files
              It's better to wear off by working than to rust by doing nothing.

              Comment


              • #8
                Hi Jetijs, great work!

                I Got a few questions, all related I guess.

                What would be the minimum temp?
                How fast does the process go?
                Could this run on a solar parabolic disc? ( Collect some plastic and on a sunny day process a few liters? )


                C'man

                Comment


                • #9
                  hi Jetijs

                  I wondered what happened to your tire pyrolysis, because I once read somewhere that you were doing some testing. as it looked, you had quite a high efficiency gas, which were on fire and my question is whether this has been enough to keep the boiler heating circuit to such an extent that would be self-sufficient pyrolisis

                  good work,
                  tadej

                  Comment


                  • #10
                    Hi C'man
                    The minimum temperature would be around 300 degree celsius, but it works much faster and better at around 400 degrees. Our current device produces around 5 liters per hour and the process takes around 4 hours, so 20 liters total. The tighter you pack the plastic, the more efficient. The time is the same no matter if your container is full or half full, so the more you can put in, the better. I use shredded plastic and so I can put around 25 kg of shredded plastic in a 50 liter tank. I am not sure about solar, probably not a good idea as the heat source is no reliable, as you get the heat up, you don't want it to drop considerably until the process is finished, because that would solidify all the melted plastic into a big blob and this would the take forever to remelt. Solar would probably work on very small quantities. Also the type of plastic is important, you can use only plastics that have pure hydrocarbons in them and nothing else, such as polyethylene and polypropylene. PVC should not be used as it contains large amounts of chlorine that is very toxic and would corrode the metals in your reactor. Also PET bottles are no good as they contain additional oxygen and we need the process to be in non oxygen environment. So only use plastics that contain only carbon and hydrogen.
                    It's better to wear off by working than to rust by doing nothing.

                    Comment


                    • #11
                      Originally posted by Jetijs View Post
                      I attached the basic sketch of the system.
                      Thanks.

                      Where is the info shared? Is there a website or file?

                      How do you make the coils and power them?
                      What is the tap above the machine?

                      Would it be possible to see a more detailed diagram with all parts?

                      Thanks.

                      Comment


                      • #12
                        Originally posted by sseti View Post
                        hi Jetijs

                        I wondered what happened to your tire pyrolysis, because I once read somewhere that you were doing some testing. as it looked, you had quite a high efficiency gas, which were on fire and my question is whether this has been enough to keep the boiler heating circuit to such an extent that would be self-sufficient pyrolisis

                        good work,
                        tadej
                        Hi Tadej
                        In theory the gas from tire pyrolysis can sustain the process, but I have not tried that. Tire pyrolysis was abandoned because the fuel had a horrible smell, fuel from plastics compared to that smell like roses Also that tire fuel had lots of sulfur in it and needed additional processing that is not so practical anymore. Another problem was tire shredding, a very powerful shredded needs to used to shredd the tires good enough and those cost a fortune. We got 30 liters of tire fuel from 100kg of raw tires. With plastic we get up to 95 liters from 100kg of plastic and there is nothing else than hydrocarbons in it.
                        It's better to wear off by working than to rust by doing nothing.

                        Comment


                        • #13
                          Jetijs
                          thanks for the reply
                          I had planing the manufacture of boilers for tire pyrolisis two months ago, but there was no time. now with fresh information I am happy that there was no time, as far as I proceeded to manufacture boilers for plastics.

                          tadej

                          Comment


                          • #14
                            Originally posted by bugler View Post
                            Thanks.

                            Where is the info shared? Is there a website or file?

                            How do you make the coils and power them?
                            What is the tap above the machine?

                            Would it be possible to see a more detailed diagram with all parts?

                            Thanks.
                            The basic info is shared in this topic, experienced builders should already have all the info to replicate. I will elaborate more about the construction.

                            The white inner rings in the metal drum are made out or about 50 aluminum oxide bricks. I use aluminum oxide because it is light weight and easily cut, like foam. So you cut them so that they make a circle. There are grooves cut in them to house the heating coils. The coils were bought from a kiln making company, you just tell them your power needs, voltages and other stuff and they give you nichrome wire in needed length and diameter, you just need to wind it on a round stick to form a coil and then insert in those grooves in aluminum oxide bricks. Our device has six coils rated for 1kW each, so 6 kW total heating power. I use three phase current, six coils are connected in 3 parallel pairs, a pair for each phase. They are switched on and off using three solid state relays that are controlled by a digital thermostat. The thermocouple is located on the lid of the reactor. There is a metal cage in the barrel that keeps the reactor container apart from the bricks and coils. You just slide the reactor container in, bolt the lid on and connect the condensing reservoirs and off you go. The pipe from the lid goes through three condensing containers, but there could just as well be only one. The plastic melts and boils in the reactor, the vapors go to the condensing container where it cools down and most part of the vapors turn into liquid, remaining vapors that contain mostly gas go through a safety bubbler which catches the last bits of fuel leaving only gas, that you can burn. There usually is very little fuel in the bubbler after the process, and it foats on tor of water and can be easy removed.
                            Hope this helps,
                            If you have any other questions, don't hesitate to ask
                            It's better to wear off by working than to rust by doing nothing.

                            Comment


                            • #15
                              Looks good

                              Many other ways one could heat this. I was thinking either waste motor oil burner, or wood gas stove. A waist oil burner you could regulate the burn much better.

                              The real question in my mind is the quality of what is distilled. What effect it would have on an engine.

                              Thanks for sharing.
                              See my experiments here...
                              http://www.youtube.com/marthale7

                              You do not have to prove something for it to be true. However, you do have to prove something for others to believe it true.

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