EXTENDED ABSTRACT

COMPARISON OF EFFECTIVENESS OF THE VARIOUS SPECIES OF CITRUS’ PEELS AS

STYROFOAM DECOMPOSER

Kenneth Ezekiel Suprantoni

Gabriela Amanda
SMAK BPK PENABUR Holis, Bandung-Jawa Barat/ Indonesia, ken35kiel@gmail.com

1. Introduction

Styrofoam has become such an accepted everyday product that people often don’t realize that it is
made from polystyrene. Polystyrene is a petroleum-based plastic. In fact, Styrofoam is the trade name
from polystyrene. It gained popularity because it is lightweight, offers good insulation properties that keep
products cold or hot, and keeps things safe during the shipping process without adding weight. While there
are some positive aspects of the material, the years have shown that styrofoam also has harmful effects,
starting from styrene that is used to make polystyrene. The EPA and the International Agency for Research
on Cancer have established styrene as a possible human carcinogen. For those who are exposed regularly in
the manufacture of the products made with styrene, there are many acute health effects such as irritations of
the skin, eye, etc. Styrofoam is also non-biodegradable as it appears to last forever because it is resistant to
photolysis, or the breaking down of materials by protons originating from a light source. The
manufacturing process of styrofoam also releases 57 chemical by-products, according to The National
Bureau of Standars Center for Fire Research. It doesn’t only pollute the air, but also produces loads of
liquid and solid waste that need disposal. It is also non-sustainable because of the manufacturing process
that uses petroleum, additionally, petroleum production creates heavy pollution. And last, the usage of
styrofoam containers for food have a possibiltiy for the chemicals inside the styrofoam to leach into the
food, affecting human health and the reproductive systems. A lot of past researchers have discovered that
limonene, contained in the essential oil contained in the most outer layer of the citrus species can dissolve
polystyrene. This method will at least overcome the issue of styrofoam being non-biodegradable, but still,
we have to prevent and minimize the usage of styrofoam because there’s a lot of the harmful effects
besides it being non-biodegradable.

2. Problem Statement

Which citrus peel is the most effective to dissolve polystyrene, by looking at its rate of dissolvence
and its content of the limonene in the essential oil. Because, to utilize this method of dissolving styrofoam,
it is really advantageous to find and use the most effective way. Because of the time of dissolvence will
differ greatly between rates of dissolvence when frequenlty used.

3. The purpose of the investigation

This study is purposed to dissolve styrofoam using the fastest and most effective citrus peels that
will help future recycling process of styrofoam more effective and also compare the effectiveness of the
citrus peels’ contents to dissolve the styrofoam.

4. Research Methods

This experiment was conducted by processing the citrus’ peels that contains d-limonene, and
converting it to polymer flocculant that is used to dissolve styrofoam into water, and the methods are
divided into 4 processes, namely Extracting the citrus peels, Mixing and soaking the extracted peels
together (but still separating it based on species) with pieces of styforoam, Burying the mixture into the
ground, and Checking its progress. To do the experiment, several kinds of orange peel are used. They are
Lime (Citrus aurantifolia), Lime (Citrus x hystrix DC.), Lemon (Citrus lemon), Pontianak Orange (Citrus
nobilis Lour. var. microcarpa Hassk.) and Pomelo (Citrus maxima). The process is described as followed.
 (1) Squeeze the citrus peels.
(2) Cut the styrofoam into pieces of 3cmx3cmx3cm and soak it in the extracted citrus peels.
(3) Dig a hole in the ground and put the mixture inside it then bury it to let it decompose naturally. It can
decompose and dissolve naturally because of the limonene substance that can melt the styrofoam.
(4) Check the buried ground daily to check the progress of each mixture. If the styrofoam has turned into a
thick substance and be absorbed by the ground, then the process is done.

The process of comparing the rate of dissolvence between citrus’ peels species is done with 3 holes for
each species of citrus’ peels to compare it using the same species and taking the most effective one as the
representative of the potential rate of dissolvence for the species of citrus’ peel.

5. Results and Analysis

From the experiment, it is found that Citrus aurantifolia needs 30 days, Citrus x hystrix DC. needs
26 days, Citrus lemon needs 13 days, Citrus nobilis Lour. var. microcarpa Hassk. needs 8 days and Citrus
maxima needs 7 days to decompose the styrofoam. This is caused by the different amount of the d-
limonene that is present in the content of the essential oil. The content of d-limonene in the each of the
essential oil produced by each species of citrus’ peels are as follows.

To take another look at it, we can look at the table below.

Name of species Days of dissolvence Content percentage of Limonene
Citrus aurantifolia 30 days 10%
Citrus x hystrix DC 26 days 26,04%
Citrus lemon 13 days 55-70%
Citrus nobilis lour. var. 8 days 87%
Microcarpa hassk
Citrus maxima 7 days 90,96%

6. Consclusion

Citrus maxima or Pomelo, has the most effective rate of dissolvence based on the days it dissolves
the 3cmx3cmx3cm styrofoam pieces of 7 days. This is because of the content percentage of limonene in the
Citrus maxima is the largest, so there’s less of the substance that isn’t relevant to the dissolvence of the
styrofoam.
References
(1) How styrofoam is bad for the environment (http://excesslogic.com/recycling-environment/how-
styrofoam-is-bad-for-the-environment/)
(2) Metode Baru Pengolahan Limbah Styrofoam (http://lanakelana.blogspot.com/2009/04/kemasan-
makanan-sampai-saat-ini-masih.html?m=1)
(3) Styrofoam bagi lingkungan (http://erizaltanjungbajuorder.blogspot.com/2014/10/styrofoam-bagi-
lingkungan.html?m=1)