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An innovative route for plastics recycling is proposed, based on a combination of a logarithmic sorting process and colour plus high-resolution near-infrared (NIR) sensors. Although counterintuitive, it is shown that such a technology could sort clean flakes from rigid packaging waste into a very large number of different plastic grades with modest sorter capacity, provided that the chosen sensor is able to differentiate correctly between any two grades of plastics in the waste. Tests with high-resolution NIR on single pixels of transparent flakes from different types and brands of packaging show that this is indeed the case for a selection of 20 different packaging items bought from shops. Moreover, the results seem to indicate, in line with previous research, that high-resolution NIR data can be linked to important physical plastic properties like the melt flow viscosity and tensile strength. The attraction of deep sorting of waste plastics with relatively cheap sensors and modest sorter capacity is that the present industrial practice of tuning plastic grades to specific applications could coexist with commercial high-grade recycling at high levels of circularity and low carbon footprint. Therefore, advanced recycling technology is likely to be a societal alternative to phasing out plastics for rigid applications.
Yuri Van Engelshoven; Pingping Wen; Maarten Bakker; Ruud Balkenende; Peter Rem. An Innovative Route to Circular Rigid Plastics. Sustainability 2019, 11, 6284 .
AMA StyleYuri Van Engelshoven, Pingping Wen, Maarten Bakker, Ruud Balkenende, Peter Rem. An Innovative Route to Circular Rigid Plastics. Sustainability. 2019; 11 (22):6284.
Chicago/Turabian StyleYuri Van Engelshoven; Pingping Wen; Maarten Bakker; Ruud Balkenende; Peter Rem. 2019. "An Innovative Route to Circular Rigid Plastics." Sustainability 11, no. 22: 6284.
The bottom ashes resulted annually from the incineration of municipal solid waste in Europe contain about 400,000 tonnes of metallic aluminium and 200,000 tonnes of heavy non-ferrous metals, such as copper and zinc. Efficient recovery of this non-ferrous metal resource requires state-of-the-art separation technologies and a continuous feedback of laboratory analyses of the metal products and the depleted bottom ash to the operators of the bottom ash treatment plants. A methodology is presented for the optimization of the production of non-ferrous metal value from Municipal Solid Waste Incinerator bottom ash. Results for an incineration plant in the Netherlands show that efficient recycling can have a significant impact on value recovery as well as on non-ferrous metal recycling rates, producing up to 8% more revenue and 25% more metals from the ash.
Simon P. M. Berkhout; Bert P.M. Oudenhoven; Peter C. Rem. Optimizing Non-Ferrous Metal Value from MSWI Bottom Ashes. Journal of Environmental Protection 2011, 02, 564 -570.
AMA StyleSimon P. M. Berkhout, Bert P.M. Oudenhoven, Peter C. Rem. Optimizing Non-Ferrous Metal Value from MSWI Bottom Ashes. Journal of Environmental Protection. 2011; 02 (05):564-570.
Chicago/Turabian StyleSimon P. M. Berkhout; Bert P.M. Oudenhoven; Peter C. Rem. 2011. "Optimizing Non-Ferrous Metal Value from MSWI Bottom Ashes." Journal of Environmental Protection 02, no. 05: 564-570.