Post Consumer Plastic: Collection, Recycling and Reuse

Post-consumer recycled plastic and recycled plastic polymers that derive from the separate collection of household waste are a relatively recent achievement in a world that is moving towards circularity of goods and resources.

In the context of the circular economy , that area of interest that concerns the study and application of methods, production systems and legislative, suitable for recycling end-of-life products, plastic is certainly a primary player in collection, processing and reuse.

Recycled plastic is defined as post-consumer when the product, in the form of packaging or finished object, fulfills the task for which it is produced and delivered, through separate collection, to mechanical recycling plants, to create new raw material in a sort of continuous circularity.

In Italy, the collection of post-consumer waste and its basic selection is entrusted, predominantly, to national consortia, such as Corepla for packaging such as HDPE, PP, LDPE, PET and PS, Coripet for PET packaging only and Conip for rigid packaging from the sector fruit and vegetables, just to name a few. But each country, where separate collection is regulated and organized, has its own national collection structure or structures.

Among the most collected and recycled products we find:

• LDPE, low density polyethylene, which comes from the collection of flexible packaging, such as bags, films packaging, cover sheets, and rigid packaging such as flower pots.

• HDPE, high density polyethylene, which mainly comes from the collection of detergent bottles and liquid cans.

• PP, polypropylene, which derives from flexible packaging such as packaging films but also from rigid packaging such as boxes, bumpers, games, chairs, tables, construction products, such as pipes, siphons , grids, crawl spaces, tiles, buckets.

• PS, polystyrene, which comes from packaging, jars and many items for the construction and electrical sector, such as sockets for electricity, electrical panels.

• PET, polyethylene terephthalate, in post-consumer plastic is mainly expressed by bottles of mineral water and soft drinks.

The processing of post-consumer plastic packaging involves in-depth knowledge of the collection chain, of industrial recycling systems of waste and the application of the resulting raw material for the creation of new products.

The separate collection of plastic materials, but also of the other collected products, such as glass, metals, wood, paper, rubber contribute significantly to reduce the carbon footprint, to regulate waste management so that it does not go into the environment and to save raw materials that otherwise would have to be extracted from the planet.

Collecting waste, recycling it, creating new raw materials from waste, producing new products through the circularity of the production and consumption system is one of the keys, but not the only one that allows the design of a better world.

A supply chain of great importance, also at an economic level, which actively contributes to the budgets of the states to provide work and create an important sustainability among humans It's the nature. A supply chain that includes not only the production of raw materials obtained from waste, but also the machinery and molds industry for production and its control, producers of finished objects made of recycled plastic, service companies, transport companies, research institutions and much more.

Automatic translation. We apologize for any inaccuracies. Original article in Italian.