Improving the flame retardancy behaviour of polyethylene

• Main Author: Song, Jun Yi
• Other Authors: Aravind Dasari
• Format: Final Year Project
• Language: English
• Published: Nanyang Technological University 2020
• Subjects: Engineering::Materials
• Online Access: https://hdl.handle.net/10356/139147
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

Neat polyethylene acts as a prominent source of fuel to the combustion process while undergoing thermal decomposition breakdown. It is highly flammable with a limiting oxygen index of 17%. Improving the flame retardancy of polyethylene has been a major challenge to researchers, attributed to the absence of reactive side groups to promote further reactions and the ability of polymeric chains to fold into a cyclic char structure. Some polyethylene systems may have succeeded in obtaining a V-0 rating in Underwriters Laboratory 94 test standards with the excessive incorporation of additives, compromising the properties of polyethylene or emits harmful volatiles to the environment.