Plastic recycling technologies
Among the strategies to tackle the challenge of plastic waste, recycling is one of the core pillars of the circular economy approach. Currently, there are multiple recycling technologies for plastic waste, ranging from established processes such as mechanical processes to emerging technologies such as solvent-based recycling and chemical recycling (i.e. depolymerization and feedstock recycling).
These technologies are also influenced by non-technical system elements (e.g. market factors, politics, etc.) which determine their development and diffusion. SusTec investigates recycling technologies and related supply chains from a techno-economic, sustainability transition, and innovation perspective.
SusTec’s research activities on plastic recycling are embedded in the following projects:
• OREO: project in collaboration with the petrochemical industry to evaluate optimization strategies for plastic waste streams and the role of mechanical and chemical recycling technologies
• external pageINCREACE: EU project focused on the uptake of recycled plastics in Electrical and Electronic Equipment (EEE)
Key activities:
• Investigation of the policy landscape promoting the circular economy transition of the European plastics industry, analyzing how current policy instruments at the EU level affect different actors of the value chain. The study aims to highlight how well different policies and regulations are aligned with each other to promote plastics recycling and circularity in the electronics sector.
• Examination of the regulatory environment surrounding the recycling of plastic waste to evaluate the impact of EU and national policies on the development of chemical recycling technologies and vice versa.
• Techno-economic assessment of different recycling routes to replace virgin with recycled plastics in electronic products, modeling material flows and life-cycle costs of different recycling technologies, and analyzing how different policy settings may affect the economics of plastic recycling for challenging waste streams.
• Case-study analysis on automotive plastic waste based on stakeholders’ interviews and material waste flows to examine system elements influencing technological developments and interactions between recycling processes. This analysis includes an assessment of value chain configurations and necessary changes to increase recycling rates.
• Development of a framework for complementarity between plastic recycling technologies, assessing the compatibility and synergies between various recycling methods to optimize overall resource recovery and environmental impact reduction. This research aims to determine how different recycling technologies can work together harmoniously within a circular economy framework to enhance the efficiency and effectiveness of plastic waste management.
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