Biodegradation in Soil of the PHB/Wood Flour (80/20) and PHB/Sisal Fiber (80/20) Tubes

This paper presents the results of a study that aimed to monitor and evaluate biodegradation in soil, by the mass loss and the mechanical properties of plastic tubes. For this work, there were extruded and injected plastic tubes made of biodegradable polymer poly(hydroxybutyrate) - (PHB) and composite PHB/Wood Flour and PHB/Sisal Fiber, both with 20% fiber. There were used three biodegradation test devices for 30, 60 and 90 days. At the end of each test, the biodegraded samples were taken from soil, washed thoroughly with water, dried and weighed to evaluate the mass loss. Mechanical properties were evaluated using flexural tests before and after biodegradation in soil. Based on the results, it was observed that all the studied tubes lost mass over the biodegradation test, and the tubes of biodegradable composites lost more weight than pure PHB.