Production of CoFe2O4/Natural Organic Matter (NOM) Nanocompositefrom Iron Mining Wastes to Remove Some Variety of Polymer Types,Including Polyethylene, Polypropylene, Polystyrene and PolyvinylChloride

In this study, a hybrid cobalt ferrite doped natural organic matter (CoFe2O4/NOM) nanocomposite (NC) was generated from iron ions recovered from iron ore mining tailings using as precursors. The products were evaluated in terms of their potential for the catalytic reduction of Polyethylene (PE), Polypropylene (PP), Polystyrene (PS) and Polyvinyl chloride (PVC) nanoplastics. The characteristics of the synthesized CoFe2O4/NOM NCs were assessed using XRD, FTIR, FESEM, HRTEM, and VSM analyses, respectively. PE is a member of the important family of polyolefin resins. PP is slightly harder and more heat-resistant compared to PE. PS is a synthetic polymer made from monomers of the aromatic hydrocarbon styrene. PVC is the world's third-most widely produced synthetic polymer of plastic after PE and PP polymers. For maximum PE, PP, PS and PVC polymers yields (99.20 and 99.90%) the optimized conditions were as follows: a CoFe2O4/NOM NC concentration of 10 mg/l, a CoFe2O4 to NOM ratio of 4.2%, a contact time of 30 min, a pH of 7.0, a sunlight power of 30 W/m2 and a temperature of 30°C. Increasing the contact time from 5 to 30 min led to an increase in photooxidation efficiencies of PE, PP, PS and PVC polymers from around 80-90% to 99.90% and 99.20%, respectively. Reusability studies for CoFe2O4/NOM exhibited high yields during ten cycles with the same yields obtained in the first cycle (99.90% for PE; PP and PS and 99.20% for PVC).