What would the products of photolysis degredation of PET plastic be?

[lostminty]

Interested in this because plastic drinking bottles have a taint to them when left out in the sun. I gather its from UV degredation of the PET plastic.

I'd like to find a catalyst that would allow the PET byproducts to be non water soluble/sequester or even evaporate.

 

[Astronuc]

Interested in this because plastic drinking bottles have a taint to them when left out in the sun. I gather its from UV degredation of the PET plastic.

I'd like to find a catalyst that would allow the PET byproducts to be non water soluble/sequester or even evaporate.

One has to balance that degradation against the desire for non-leaching of the plastic into the contents and long shelf life.

The exterior surface could be less critical than the interior surface, but it's difficult to treat the interior in a bottle given the geometry.

Here's some research on PET and UV.
Physico-chemical modifications of the DBD and UV irradiation treatments on the PET and PET+TiO2 films
http://134.147.160.41/ispcdocs/ispc16/CostPapers/497.pdf

See also
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultraviolet#Degradation_of_polymers.2C_pigments_and_dyes