Vol.:(0123456789) Polymer Bulletin https://doi.org/10.1007/s00289-020-03116-4 1 3 ORIGINAL PAPER Study on the efect of Kankara zeolite‑Y‑based catalyst on the chemical properties of liquid fuel from mixed waste plastics (MWPs) pyrolysis Wilson Uzochukwu Eze 1  · Innocent Chimezie Madufor 2  · Godwin Nkemjika Onyeagoro 2  · Henry Chinedu Obasi 2  · Michael Ifeanyichukwu Ugbaja 1 Received: 11 October 2019 / Revised: 18 January 2020 / Accepted: 22 January 2020 © Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature 2020 Abstract We report in this study the efect of Kankara zeolite-Y-based catalyst on the chemi- cal properties of liquid fuel from mixed waste plastics pyrolysis using a batch reac- tor. Fourteen set of 200 g of waste plastics comprising 27 wt%HDPE, 33 wt%LDPE, 13 wt%PP, 18 wt%PS, 9 wt%PET were de-polymerized with catalyst and a set without catalyst. The catalyst used comprises of a mixture of zeolite-Y, metakao- lin, aluminum hydroxide and sodium silicate all synthesized from Kankara kaolin from Kankara in Katsina state, Nigeria. Fourteen diferent catalyst combinations derived from design of experiment using Design expert 11.0 were used to produce fourteen diferent liquid fuel samples, and the liquid sample with the highest yield was determined. Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy was used to detect vari- ous characteristic functional groups present in the samples. Furthermore, the various compounds in the uncatalyzed (thermal pyrolysis) and catalyzed samples with high- est yield were determined using GC/MS. The results show that the highest yield of liquid fuel from the fourteen catalyst combination was 46.7 wt% while the thermal pyrolysis gave a yield of 66.9 wt%. The GC/MS result shows carbon in the range of C 6 –C 13 and absence of long straight chain parafns in the catalyzed fuel samples while the uncatalyzed sample has carbon in the range of C 7 –C 20 . Consequently, the thermal pyrolysis sample consists of 59%, 36% and 5% of gasoline, diesel and fuel oil, respectively, while the catalyzed sample consists of 93% gasoline and 7% diesel fraction. Keywords Pyrolysis · Mixed waste plastics · Kankara zeolite-Y · Catalyst · Liquid fuel * Wilson Uzochukwu Eze wilstyrene@yahoo.ca Extended author information available on the last page of the article