Polymer Waste - Biopolymers & Bioplastics

Renewable Resources and Biopolymers

The use of renewable resources provides an incentive to extend nonrenewable petrochemical supplies. The agriculture industry produces sufficient supplies of some agricultural products that could be used as renewable sources for polymer feed stocks, either through direct use or indirectly as carbon sources to drive fermentation processes. Biodegradability is an additional benefit of renewable sources of polymers. Any polymer synthesized by a biological system is inherently biodegradable. Biocompatibility is a potential benefit in some cases. Biopolymers are polymeric biomolecules polymers that are produced by living organisms. Since they are polymers, biopolymers contain monomeric units that are covalently bonded to form larger structures. There are three main classes of biopolymers, classified according to the monomeric units used and the structure of the biopolymer formed: polynucleotides (RNA and DNA), which are long polymers composed of 13 or more nucleotide monomers; polypeptides, which are short polymers of amino acids; and polysaccharides, which are often linear bonded  polymeric carbohydrate structures.