Defining requirements of PET scrap for open loop recycling of post-industrial waste
(2020) KETM05 20192Chemical Engineering (M.Sc.Eng.)
- Abstract
- To reduce the environmental impact and minimize the exploitation of the depleting re-sources, the transition to a circular economy is vital. It proposes an economy of reduced ma-terial consumption and increased reuse and recycling of plastics and other materials. Only last year, 359 million tonnes of plastic were produced worldwide and only a third of the col-lected waste in Europe was recycled. Among the five largest produced commodity plastics, polyethylene terephthalate (PET) has the highest recycling rates. The recycled PET on the market is mostly post-consumer waste, mainly PET bottles. If bottle-to bottle recycling is to increase, other recycled PET grades need to enter the market. In the production of foamed plastics, waste is... (More)
- To reduce the environmental impact and minimize the exploitation of the depleting re-sources, the transition to a circular economy is vital. It proposes an economy of reduced ma-terial consumption and increased reuse and recycling of plastics and other materials. Only last year, 359 million tonnes of plastic were produced worldwide and only a third of the col-lected waste in Europe was recycled. Among the five largest produced commodity plastics, polyethylene terephthalate (PET) has the highest recycling rates. The recycled PET on the market is mostly post-consumer waste, mainly PET bottles. If bottle-to bottle recycling is to increase, other recycled PET grades need to enter the market. In the production of foamed plastics, waste is produced and accumulated. To decrease the environmental impact of the process it was investigated how to best recycle the waste. The requirements of recycled PET were defined by comparison of existing PET on the market, both virgin and recycled. The most important properties of recycled PET are the intrinsic viscosity and the melting tem-perature and to be processable they cannot differ considerably compared to virgin PET. Ad-ditionally, the quantity and type of contaminants present is important for its recyclability. It was concluded that the plastic scrap from the production has a high intrinsic viscosity and an acceptable melting temperature for reprocessing. However, the plastic waste contains an organic blowing agent and the effect of the compound to reprocessing is unknown and re-quires further investigation. An economic analysis was made to compare three alternatives of waste handling. It was concluded that the current case with circulation is the most eco-nomically beneficial option. Possible applications for the recycled waste was evaluated and several suitable applications were found. The sector with the highest potential was the build-ing and construction sector with applications of high value and good recyclability. (Less)
- Abstract (Swedish)
- För att minska miljöpåverkan och minimera exploateringen av de begränsade tillgångar som finns så krävs en övergång till cirkulär ekonomi. Det innebär minskad materialkonsumtion och mer återanvändning och återvinning av plast och andra material. Förra året producerades i världen 359 millioner ton plast och av det insamlade avfallet i Europa blev endast en tred-jedel återvunnet. Bland de fem mest producerade volymplasterna är polyetylentereftalat (PET) den mest återvunna. Den återvunna PET som finns på marknaden är främst från PET-flaskor. För att minska användandet av återvunna PET-flaskor till andra produkter behövs andra typer av återvunnen PET på marknaden, exempelvis från processavfall. Vid tillverk-ningen av skumplast bildas avfall... (More)
- För att minska miljöpåverkan och minimera exploateringen av de begränsade tillgångar som finns så krävs en övergång till cirkulär ekonomi. Det innebär minskad materialkonsumtion och mer återanvändning och återvinning av plast och andra material. Förra året producerades i världen 359 millioner ton plast och av det insamlade avfallet i Europa blev endast en tred-jedel återvunnet. Bland de fem mest producerade volymplasterna är polyetylentereftalat (PET) den mest återvunna. Den återvunna PET som finns på marknaden är främst från PET-flaskor. För att minska användandet av återvunna PET-flaskor till andra produkter behövs andra typer av återvunnen PET på marknaden, exempelvis från processavfall. Vid tillverk-ningen av skumplast bildas avfall som sedan ackumuleras. För att minska processens miljö-påverkan undersöktes hur avfallet bäst återvinns. Kraven på återvunnen PET definierades genom att jämföra befintlig PET på marknaden, både återvunnen och jungfrulig. De viktig-aste egenskaperna för återvunnen PET är IV-värde (intrinsic viscosity), och smälttemperatur och för att kunna bearbetas kan det inte vara betydande skillnader mot jungfrulig PET. Dess-sutom är mängden och typ av kontamineringar viktiga för att återvunnen PET ska kunna bearbetas igen. Processavfallet från skumplasttillverkningen har ett högt IV-värde och har en acceptabel smälttemperatur. Dock så innehåller avfallet ett organisk blåsmedel och det är okänt hur ämnet påverkar omarbetning och behöver därför utredas ytterligare. En ekonomisk analys gjordes för att jämföra tre alternativ av avfallshantering. Det nuvarande fallet med recirkulering visade sig vara det mest ekonomiska alternativet. Möjliga tillämpningar av avfallet utvärderades och flera lämpliga tillämpningar hittades. Högst potential har bygg-nadssektorn med flera högvärdestillämpningar med goda möjligheter till återvinning. (Less)
- Popular Abstract (Swedish)
- Om världen ska hinna räddas från klimatförändringarna behöver återvinningen öka nu. För att underlätta återvinning av processavfall undersöktes därför incitament och problem såväl som tekniska krav för att utvärdera PET-spillet hos ett företag.
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
http://lup.lub.lu.se/student-papers/record/9004400
- author
- Digné, Josephine LU
- supervisor
- organization
- course
- KETM05 20192
- year
- 2020
- type
- H2 - Master's Degree (Two Years)
- subject
- keywords
- Chemical Engineering, plastics, thermoplastics, PET, polyethylene terephthalate, foamed plastics, recycling, post-industrial waste, circular economy, återvinning, kemiteknik
- language
- English
- id
- 9004400
- date added to LUP
- 2020-02-25 12:19:31
- date last changed
- 2020-02-25 12:19:31
@misc{9004400,
abstract = {{To reduce the environmental impact and minimize the exploitation of the depleting re-sources, the transition to a circular economy is vital. It proposes an economy of reduced ma-terial consumption and increased reuse and recycling of plastics and other materials. Only last year, 359 million tonnes of plastic were produced worldwide and only a third of the col-lected waste in Europe was recycled. Among the five largest produced commodity plastics, polyethylene terephthalate (PET) has the highest recycling rates. The recycled PET on the market is mostly post-consumer waste, mainly PET bottles. If bottle-to bottle recycling is to increase, other recycled PET grades need to enter the market. In the production of foamed plastics, waste is produced and accumulated. To decrease the environmental impact of the process it was investigated how to best recycle the waste. The requirements of recycled PET were defined by comparison of existing PET on the market, both virgin and recycled. The most important properties of recycled PET are the intrinsic viscosity and the melting tem-perature and to be processable they cannot differ considerably compared to virgin PET. Ad-ditionally, the quantity and type of contaminants present is important for its recyclability. It was concluded that the plastic scrap from the production has a high intrinsic viscosity and an acceptable melting temperature for reprocessing. However, the plastic waste contains an organic blowing agent and the effect of the compound to reprocessing is unknown and re-quires further investigation. An economic analysis was made to compare three alternatives of waste handling. It was concluded that the current case with circulation is the most eco-nomically beneficial option. Possible applications for the recycled waste was evaluated and several suitable applications were found. The sector with the highest potential was the build-ing and construction sector with applications of high value and good recyclability.}},
author = {{Digné, Josephine}},
language = {{eng}},
note = {{Student Paper}},
title = {{Defining requirements of PET scrap for open loop recycling of post-industrial waste}},
year = {{2020}},
}