| abstract |
The present invention relates to a process for the recovery of lactide from polylactide (PLA) or glycolide from polyglycolide (PGA), in which in a first step PLA or PGA is brought into contact with a hydrolyzing medium and degraded hydrolytically to oligomers. In a further step, a cyclizing depolymerization of the oligomers obtained in the first step to the lactide or glycolide takes place. In addition, the present invention relates to a device based on the combination of a hydrolysis device with a depolymerization reactor, with which the method described above can be carried out. The core of the process according to the invention is a partial hydrolysis of the originally used polymeric materials in combination with a cyclizing depolymerization. |