Sulfonation of Waste High Impact Polystyrene from Food Packaging as a Polymeric Flocculant

摘要

Sulfonation of waste high impact polystyrene from commercial food packaging was studied in this work. The obtained sulfonated polystyrene was characterized by using Fourier Transformed Infrared spectroscopy. Effect of the reaction time and temperature on the degree of sulfonation was observed. Waste high impact polystyrene resin from food packaging showed degree of sulfonation at 72.2% level. This degree of sulfonation was lower than the same reaction on pure polystyrene and pure high impact polystyrene, which showed degree of sulfonation at 97.7% and 85.2% level, respectively. Simulation of flocculation test using kaolin suspension was conducted to evaluate the application of sulfonated polystyrene as a polymeric flocculant.