why does plastic deteriorate into microplastic. Why cant we break microplastic into just carbon chains?
In: Chemistry
Plastic deterioates into microplastics because of natural processes. Heat, sunlight, and other environmental stresses break down these plastics over time, just like other materials.
They get to the point where they are broken down to the point where natural circumstances can no longer significantly break them down anymore. This is microplastics.
You can break down microplastics into carbon chains but this is not an easy process. Those carbon chains you mentioned have very strong bonds and intermolecular forces, hence why plastic is used so often, it’s strong. You can break them down with special equipment that requires a lot of energy but it’s time consuming and not worth the effort if it isn’t on a mass scale.
Plastics are also usually contaminated so you can’t simply just break them down into “just carbon chains”.
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