PROJECT DESCRIPTION
BACKGROUND
The EU collects over 27 million tonnes of plastics from post-consumer waste every year, but only around 31% of this plastic is recycled, with the remaining waste sent to landfill or incinerated. This means that more than 7.4 million tonnes of plastic waste go to landfill every year - materials which take more than 1 000 years to degrade.
Plastic mix, made of polypropylene, polystyrene and expanded polystyrene (PP, PS & EPS), accounts for 16% of the total plastic collected from municipal solid waste. Plastic mix is commonly used for products like packaging, bottles and trays.
The majority of recycled PP, PS & EPS comes from industry, end-of-life vehicles, agriculture and electronic equipment. There is no widely-implemented solution for post-consumer plastic waste other than energy recovery. This is mainly because such plastic tends to be contaminated with organic materials which absorb humidity and odours and makes recycling difficult.
OBJECTIVES
The main objective of the LIFEPLASMIX project was to demonstrate a set of cost-effective technologies to recover and recycle plastic mix (PP, PS & EPS) contained in municipal solid waste. These materials were recycled into high-quality pellets ready to be used in new products, including food packaging. A pilot plant located in Alhendn, Spain, aimed to produce over 3 700 tonnes of recycled plastics each year.
LIFEPLASMIX contributed to solving of one of the EU’s priority issues on the generation of plastic waste. Specifically, it addressed the European strategy for plastics in a circular economy, which establishes recovery and recycling rates of 50% of municipal solid waste by 2025, and a maximum of 10% sent to landfill by 2035.
RESULTS
LIFEPLASMIX’s main objective was to demonstrate how to recover and recycle plastic mix waste contained in the "remaining" fraction of the municipal solid wastes, avoiding its incineration and landfilling. Valorising PP, PS (GPPS+HIPS) and EPS (EPS+XPS) into high quality recycled pellets ready to be used in new products, including food packaging (one of the most stringent markets), was also paramount.
The plant has been in operation since the spring of 2022 (except for the sorting line, which started in March 2021). It worked appropriately for the polypropylene (PP), while not so efficiently for polystyrene (PS) and expanded polystyrene (EPS). Consequently, the configuration of the pilot plant was changed to sort PP, polyethylene terephthalate (PET) and high-density polyethylene (HDPE). Up to March 2024, the beneficiaries processed 8 773 tonnes of mixed plastic bales in the pilot plant, with a total of 4 806 tonnes of recycled plastics produced (3 509 tonnes of PP, 480 tonnes of PS, 237 tonnes of EPS, 264 tonnes of PET and 316 tonnes of HDPE). Some industrial tests have been conducted with the recycled PP, producing food trays, automotive signalling pieces, fruit boxes, pallets, urban furniture and other elements, such as signal cones and beacons.
Despite some problems during the implementation, the beneficiaries proved the technical, environmental and economic feasibility of the process for PP, PET and HDPE. The associated Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) and economic study showed better performance with recycled PP, PET and HDPE than with virgin plastic. A reduction of the carbon footprint and water consumption of 72% and 53% respectively were registered. The economic study thus showed a net benefit of around EUR 16 million in 10 years.
The most realistic replication scenario considers five replicas in the short-medium term, in addition to the continuation of the operation of the project pilot plant, which is planned to continue processing plastic mix bales produced at Alhendín Ecocentral.
