Upgrading Mixed Textile Waste to Nano Onion-Like Fullerenes by the Two-Step Flash Joule Heating

Abstract Real-world mixed textile waste streams seriously hinder recycling. Herein, we present a two-step flash Joule heating (FJH) strategy for directly upgrading mixed textile waste into ordered multilayer nano onion-like fullerenes (NOLFs). The interaction between different fibers, termed a “scaffolding effect” involving physical confinement and chemical bonding, was strengthened by the precarbonization (280 °C) treatment. Consequently, the polyester/cotton mixture can be upgraded to NOLFs within 5 s with high quality (I2D/IG = 1.47) and yield (41.6%) at 2000 °C, and this technology can be successfully extended to other textiles and solid wastes (polyamide, straws, etc.). The evolution pathway of carbon atoms leading to the formation of the core pentagonal/hexagonal ring structure in NOLFs was systematically investigated in this work. Moreover, an automated FJH prototype was developed to produce NOLFs with 86.4 g·day–1 continuously, and these NOLFs derived an excellent performance as electrode and lubricant.