ONYRIQ, company member of Cluster MAV, is looking for a maverick and passionate good person to apply at the Tecniospring Industry programme (co-financed by European Union’s H2020 - Marie Sklodowska-Curie actions), who can lead the scientific development of the project as R&D Senior Scientist.
The Tecniospring Industry researcher will be focused on the most promising research pipeline towards chemical recycling of polyolefins, based on the controlled degradation of polyolefins at mild conditions. ONYRIQ has developed an upcycling technology of polyethylene and polypropylene with the formation of carboxylic acids. Within this project, we aim to develop an optimized, robust and industrially scalable procedure suitable for a wide spectrum of polyolefin-based materials, in agreement with the real waste from household and industrial collection. The target materials will include not only aliphatic (HDPE, LDPE, PP) but aromatic (PS, EPS) polyolefin sources, different grades of purity and additives, mixed formats (rigid, foams and films) and multimaterial products (laminates, composites, metallized or multilayers). The adaptation of the chemical oxidation technology will chase the highest energy and material efficiency, greater yields and lower costs regarding to its implementation in a feasibly industrial procedure.
For non-PhD candidates, the applicants should have at least 6 years of full-time equivalent research experience, including the period of research training, after obtaining the Master degree.
Strong background on organic chemistry, synthesis and catalysis. Knowledge on polymer chemistry and plastic recycling will be positively evaluated.
Research experience abroad (out of Spain) of at least 2 years within the last 36 months.
End of 2021 - Beginning of 2022
May 21, 2021
Do you want to get onboard? Just ping us at contact@onyriq.com
Please, note that the candidates without these credentials will not be considered for this position.
One of the most challenging issues for our society is the management of plastic waste. In 2018, the EU-28 produced 61,8 Mt of plastic material and collected 29,1 Mt of plastic waste, of which the 25% was still sent to landfill. The recycling fraction corresponds to only 32% of the collected plastic waste, often downcycled; whereas the major fraction (43%) ends up in energy recovery processes (e.g. incineration), with a positive balance of CO2 emissions that contributes to Global Warming and results in low energy efficiency process. The recyclability by mechanical procedures depends strongly on the format, quality, purity and presence of other materials (i.e. multilayer or multimaterial) and additives in the post-consume or postindustrial product. In this way, the plastics that do not reach specific requisites are discarded and sent to energy recovery processes or, worst, to landfill.The family of polyolefins represents the largest demand of plastics, corresponding to more than 55% of the total existing plastics, surpassing the polyvinyl chloride, PVC (10%) or polyethylene terephthalate, PET (7.7%). Moreover, the main application of the polyolefin plastics (polyethylene, PE, polypropylene, PP or polystyrene, PS) is in the packaging industry, leading to products with a very short service life that will be thrown away.
Nowadays, several sustainable alternatives to incineration are being developed and studied in order to create a complementary recovery to those materials that cannot be mechanically recycled. Chemical recycling consists in the breaking down of a polymer by heat, chemical agents or catalysts that gives rise to individual components, monomers or feedstock, that can be used to resynthesize the original product or others. When it comes to step-growth polymers such as PET, polyamides or polyurethanes, depolymerization implies the lysis of the chemical bonds of functional groups (by hydrolysis, glycolysis, methanolysis…) generating the starting monomers back, which can be polymerized again into new polymers. However, in the case of addition vinyl polymers, and specially polyolefins, the breakdown of the hydrocarbon backbone chain is challenging. Polyolefins are very stable and chemically inert and, therefore, the cleavage of C-C bond in the structure is difficult to achieve and control. Most of emerging technologies in this sense are based on pyrolysis, cracking or gasification, which require the use of high temperatures (> 400 ºC) and energy to accomplish the thermal decomposition of polyolefins into fuels, gases or organic solvents. Nonetheless, the potential for pyrolytic approaches to valorize polyolefin waste is counterbalanced by the high demand and cost of energy.
ONYRIQ is working in a greener approach for the chemical recycling of polyolefins consisting of their transformation into organic diacids at mild conditions. The chemical reactions are carried out at considerably lower temperatures (<180 ºC) and give as a result dicarboxylic organic acids that can be used as bifunctional monomers for the synthesis of high value polymers such as polyesters, polyamides or polyurethanes. This technology presents two clear advantages: it has lower energy costs and, on the other hand, generates high value recovered feedstock as an alternative to fossil raw materials for the production of new polymers.
We want R&D in polymers to reach the market, generating social and economic impact in an environmentally friendly way.
To this end, we are a customer-oriented R&D company in the field of polymeric materials, formed by a team with more than 15 years of experience in the development and implementation of both national and international research projects in diverse fields of application such as Sustainability and circular economy, Health & Medical Devices and Advanced manufacturing.
More information: https://www.onyriq.com/es/
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