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On the current market there are many types of virgin plastic pellets, among which PE Plastic is one of the safest and most widely used plastic materials today. This is proven by impressive numbers — on average, around 60 million tons are sold on the market each year, serving the production demand for various types of plastic packaging. Why is that? Let’s explore together with Hop Phat to learn more about what PE Plastic is in this detailed article.
What Is PE Plastic?
PE Plastic has the full name Polyethylene. It is a type of flexible plastic pellet with a variable crystalline structure. Because of this, this type of plastic has many outstanding properties, typically including: electrical insulation, thermal insulation, and water resistance. In reality, PE Plastic pellets are white and transparent, but during production, depending on the specific requirements of each customer, manufacturers will add colored plastic pellets to create more attractive and beautiful finished products.
Chemical Formula: Polyethylene is an organic compound (poly) consisting of many ethylene groups CH2-CH2 bonded together by intramolecular hydrogen bonds.
Polyethylene is synthesized through the polymerization reaction of ethylene monomers (C2H4).
Is PE Plastic Safe?
As mentioned above, among all types of virgin plastic pellets that have been and are being sold on the market, PE Plastic is considered one of the safest plastic raw materials. Perhaps that is why its annual consumption always achieves the highest revenue, with the majority being used to produce plastic bags.
In addition, PE Plastic is a polymerization product of the organic compound Poly and Ethylene monomers.
Outstanding Properties of PE Plastic You Should Know
Just like other virgin plastic pellets, PE Plastic pellets also have many outstanding properties. Some of those key properties include:
You can identify PE Plastic, or finished products made from PE Plastic, quite easily. Thanks to its transparency, slightly muted sheen, glossy surface, and a certain level of flexibility.
Besides that, it also has an exceptionally good ability to resist moisture and water vapor. However, its ability to resist O2, CO2, N2, as well as oils and fats is very poor.
Although PE Plastic can withstand high melting temperatures, up to 230°C, this is only for a short period of time.
It will swell and be damaged when it comes into contact with essential oils or solvents such as Alcohol, Acetone, etc.
Types of PE Plastic
- VLDPE
- LDPE
- LLDPE
- MDPE
- HDPE
- UHMWPE
- PEX (or XLPE)
Advantages and Disadvantages of PE Plastic
Below are the most outstanding advantages of PE Plastic. When deciding to use this type of plastic, you will certainly need to understand these advantages.
Advantages
PE Plastic can block water and moisture exceptionally well.
Besides that, PE also has very effective heat-sealing properties.
Especially, this plastic material has the ability to maintain its flexibility even when exposed to low temperatures. It can still function well at temperatures as low as –58°C.
There is one standout advantage that not every type of virgin plastic has. When temperature changes, the viscosity of PE will also change accordingly, making PE Plastic very easy to process.
Being a virgin plastic and transparent, it does not contain any harmful substances in its composition.
The cost is much cheaper compared to other virgin plastics.
It has a long lifespan.
PE Plastic has high bonding strength. Therefore, it has high tightness and does not leak.
PE can also withstand pressure and impact exceptionally well.
Disadvantages
Although it has many outstanding advantages, PE Plastic also has quite a few disadvantages. Therefore, you need to be aware of them in order to overcome and minimize these issues for your own products. For example:
Very high O2 gas permeability.
Limited ability to block odors within a certain range.
Extremely low resistance to oils and fats.
When melted at excessively high temperatures, it produces a very unpleasant smell.
Is PE Plastic Safe? Is It Good?
With all the advantages and disadvantages above, you can also see that PE Plastic has many special properties. This plastic material is also considered a type of plastic with low toxicity, used in some dry-clean bags, plastic packaging, bread wrapping bags, newspaper bags, frozen food packaging, and more.
Originating from virgin plastic, it is highly safe and can be reused many times. Although this plastic material still has basic characteristics such as: flexible, durable, and exceptionally good moisture resistance. However, according to some research documents, finished products made from PE Plastic should not be heated in a microwave, and high temperatures should be avoided. Because they will release harmful substances. But overall, PE is a safe type of plastic that you can use for a long time.
Outstanding Uses of PE Plastic
Although every type of finished product is made from PE Plastic, each type of PE Plastic will have a different role and function. Some of these uses are not found in every type of plastic. Specifically:
VLDPE Plastic is commonly used to produce gloves, shrink wrap, and product wrapping packaging. It is even one of the indispensable components in the transformation process of some other plastics.
UHMWPE Plastic is used to make fibers and bullet-proof liner plates, thanks to its rigid physical properties.
HDXLPE Plastic is the main raw material for producing plastic film, pipes, wires, and electrical cables.
Besides that, PE Plastic in general is also used to produce various types of bags and plastic containers with diverse sizes ranging from 1 to 20 liters. In addition, PE is also used to produce bottle caps and to manufacture equipment in the chemical industry.
Is PE Plastic Expensive?
Currently, most virgin plastic pellet products are imported from overseas. And virgin PE Plastic is also one of those plastic materials. For exactly this reason, the price depends heavily on the foreign exchange rate at the time of purchase.
However, overall, the price of virgin PE Plastic pellets is still evaluated by experts as being cheaper compared to other virgin plastic pellets. On the current market, they are priced in the range of 30,000 VND to 50,000 VND. This varies depending on the seller’s location as well as the foreign exchange rate at the time you purchase.
Outstanding Applications of PE Plastic in Manufacturing
With its unique characteristics and properties that not every plastic material possesses, PE Plastic is present in almost all areas of life. That is why you can easily notice its products appearing all around us, such as:
Coating electrical wires. Manufacturing plastic packaging. Roll film. Wrapping goods. Bags. Bottles. Cans and bottle caps, and more.
But perhaps the most prominent application is bags. Simply walking around grocery stores, supermarkets, and plastic goods shops, you can easily see rectangular, colorless, transparent bags or multicolored bags that we commonly call nylon bags. Besides that, because of its high safety, PE Plastic is also used to make bottles for milk, soft drinks, and other liquid foods that cannot do without this type of virgin plastic.
Conclusion
In summary, all products made from PE Plastic are getting closer and closer to consumers. Especially in today’s fast-paced modern life. They can appear anywhere — from village roads and alleyways, to the streets of urban areas and markets, from cities to rural regions. Everywhere, there is the presence of this PE virgin plastic.