Microwaves can turn plastic into what?

Researchers at Purdue University have found a way to turn recyclable plastic from things like single-use water bottles into functional components for batteries. Their method mostly revolves around putting it in the microwave.

Polyethylene terephthalate (PET) is one of the plastic components that makes up these bottles. The research team reduced it to flakes and then exposed it to an ultra-fast microwave irradiation process, about the equivalent of two minutes in an average household microwave.

The result was a substance called disodium terephthalate, which is being explored as a possible component in lithium-ion and sodium-ion batteries. Scientists hope that it could one day be used in place of copper and graphite anodes, because it is more environmentally friendly. This new method of producing that substance further proves that fact.