Bacteria Eat Styrofoam

chaosmage42 writes "Scientists at the University of Dublin have found a way to break down styrofoam, the bane of recyclers/composters everywhere. This could be a great step towards sustainability, but it does require the styrofoam to be heated first."

Comments

Side Effect

[dsginter]

Unfortunately, eating the styrofoam causes the bacteria to shit lead. Give a penny, take a penny.

Re:Side Effect

[evil agent]

All we need to do then is create some genetically modified mice whose urine kills the bacteria.

Ah, the circle of life...

Cancer anyone?

[BecomingLumberg]

Last I checked, heating styrofoam let off some pretty nasty gasses... Is this really the whiz-bang solution we were hoping for?

Re:Cancer anyone?

[reverseengineer]

The "pretty nasty gasses" are pretty much what the the bacteria are dining on. In this process, polystyrene is depolymerized back to styrene. Styrene is benzene with a vinyl group attached, and like most benzene derivatives, is generally bad for health, especially under prolonged exposure. The Material Safety Data Sheet for styrene notes in the toxicology section: Toxic. Carcinogen. Mutagen. Corrosive, causes burns to skin and eyes. Lachrymator. Harmful by inhalation, ingestion and through skin absorption. Long term exposure may affect CNS.

Now, styrene isn't especially toxic- the quoted toxicity data applies almost word for word for many organic liquids- gasoline (petrol), for instance. This process of breaking down polystyrene foam isn't exactly something you can safely do at home. Then again, you probably don't recycle polyethylene or aluminum at your residence either. There are safety and economies of scale issues with recycling those as well. However, it may find application on an industrial waste management scale. Done under controlled conditions, this process should certainly be no more hazardous than any other industrial process- and less hazardous than something like petroleum refining.

Another method....

[gasmonso]

Just disolve the styrofoam with gasoline and tada, you have napalm. Bingo bango, problem solved!

I hope it takes *something*

[Chris Burke]

This could be a great step towards sustainability, but it does require the styrofoam to be heated first.

I hope so. It would be rather bad if there was a bacteria that could feed on styrofoam that hadn't been altered in some way. Order some electronics online, and they arrive in a box dripping with whatever organic waste products these bacteria leave behind... Yeah, I'm glad.

Cost v. Benefit?

[jon.wolf]

From reading the article (I know, how novel!), I understand that the styrofoam must be turned into a liquid and the first thing that came to my mind was: How much energy is required to do that?

The foam doesn't just need to be warmed, it has to be heated to the point of breaking down. I can't imagine doing this on a large scale would be cheap. Would the enviromental impact resulting from the creation of millions of joules of energy required to break down styrofoam outweigh the environmental benefits of destroying the styrofoam?

Also, I have learned from my accidental non-scientific microwave experiments that melting styrofoam smells terrible. Would liquifying styrofoam on a large scale produce similar noxious fumes (and potential environmental side effects)?

bacteria..

[dan20164]

now if they could only fart ozone..

Re:This actually scares me

[Anomalous Coward]

What happens to modern society when bacteria, fungus, and other assorted critters evolve the ability to break down plastics?

Probably something similar to what would happen if bacteria, mold, insects, et. al. suddenly started being able to eat wood!! Look around at all the things that are made of wood or use wood in their construction. Civilization would surely fall if that were to ever happen. Maybe if we're really lucky it will never happen. Or maybe, just maybe, we'd learn to deal with it.