Environmental Degradations

With rubber base adhesives, it is necessary to prevent their properties from changing during service life. Oxidative changes induced by thermal, ozone exposure and UV light can dramatically affect service life of rubber base adhesives. More precisely, the rubber and the resin are quite susceptible to oxidative degradation. Environmental and physical factors exert detrimental effects on rubber base adhesive performance. These effects can be mitigated by the incorporation of low levels of stabilizers during the fabrication process of the adhesive. 

Bioremediation is defined as the use of microorganisms or microbial processes to degrade environmental contaminants. Bioremediation has numerous applications, including cleanup of groundwater, soils, lagoons, sludge, and process waste streams. 

Keywords Polyethylene Environmental degradation Environmental impact Degradation... 

The low water solubility of the material makes it unlikely that hydrolysis would be a significant route of environmental degradation. Environmental accumulation is likely to occur in sediment and not in water. 

Keywords Chromatography Degradation product Degradation Environmental impact Polyester... 

J.E. Pickett, Permanence of UV absorbers in plastics and coatings, in Handbook of Polymer Degradation, Environmental Science and Pollution Control Series 21, 2nd... 

Persistent or non-degradable environmental chemicals - even those with low volatility - may be dispersed around the globe. Polychlorinated biphenyls (PCB), polychlorinated dibenzodioxins and dibenzofurans (PCDD, PCDF), l,l,l-trichlor-2,2-bis(4-chlorphenyl)-ethan DDT, hexachlorocyclohexane (HCH) and hexachlorobenzene (HCB) have been found in samples from the Arctic and Antarctic and in the tissues of marine animals. Although the open use of many of these chemicals has been prohibited in most industrialized countries, considerable residues still remain in the environment. It is estimated that about 20% of the global production of PCBs (230 000 t/a) persists in the upper layers of the oceans and that a further 7901 are present in the atmosphere (Fiedler and Lau, 1998). Such contamination may accumulate in organisms and have negative effects that go as far as the death of whole populations in ecosystems (Jdrgensen, 1998). 

Johnsen AR, Wick LY, Harms H. (2005). Principles of microbial PAH degradation. Environmental Pollution 133 71-84. 

A major use for polystyrene is in expanded (bead) form. This material is relatively tough and is used mainly as a protective packing material, particularly for electrical equipment or as sintered and shaped boards to replace paper, cardboard, etc. in packaging containers. Like the polyolefin packaging materials, PS is often observed as a non-degradable environmental pollutant on the sea-shore due to escape of beads and pieces of broken PS foam packaging. 

H. Sigel and A. Sige (ed. ),Degradation ( Environmental Pollutantsby Microorganisms andTheirMetalloenzymes, Vol. 28 of Metal Ions in Biological Systems, Marcel Dekker, New York, 1992. 

Nishida, H. and Tokiwa, Y. (1993) Effects of higher-order structure of poly(3-hydroxybiityrate) on its biodegradation. II. effects of crystal structure on microbial degradation. /. Environmental Polymer Degradation, 1, 65-80. 

This was brought on by the growing pressure to avoid or reduce environmental pollution from waste polymers and plastics, which were accumulating widely on land and in oceans due to careless disposal, and because of the decreasing availability of landfill space for controlled disposal. Options available then, and now, were landfill, incineration, recycle, and controlled environmental degradation. Environmental degradation at that time was almost always referred to as biodegradation... 

---