With an annual plastic waste generation surpassing 400 million tons, recycling is crucial to lower environmental impact. Despite continuous efforts, material diversity and system inefficiencies can pose challenges. Let’s find out in detail about the problems with recycling plastic and solutions to overcome them.
Problems with Recycling Plastic and Solutions for Recycling
Plastic is available in different types and materials which makes it complex to recycle.
Did you know 79% of it has accumulated in the natural environment or landfill while only 12% has been incinerated and the remainder 9% is only recycled? Here, we have listed some of the notable problems and solutions:
1. Mixed Plastics Waste
Problem: Sorting and processing of these wastes efficiently is a major difficulty for the recycling sector. It includes all non-bottle plastic packaging from home waste including all kinds and colours.
Solution: Choose a product design that focuses on recycling and encourages environmental principles. It will improve the economic viability of collecting and diverting mixed plastic trash.
Also See: 4 Types of Waste and 5 Disposal Methods
2. Flexible Packaging Collection
Problem: It is linked to low weight-to-volume ratio and economic viability concerns that complicate the collection and segregation processes.
Solution: To overcome this issue, you can use specialized collecting methods and sorting facilities, particularly for films to efficiently manage the flexible packaging recycling complexities.
3. High-Performance Sorting
Problem: This recycling industry frequently faces a lack of high-performance sorting and development of end markets for each polymer recyclate stream.
Solution: It highlights the necessity of upgrading recycling plant separation techniques; this way it can boost recycling volumes and promote environmental sustainability.
If you are keen to get a complete understanding of the recycling process, check out how is plastic recycled.
4. Diverse Materials
Problem: The diversity of materials such as the inclusion of PVC or PS in rigid plastic containers complicates the sorting process and increases the possibility of cross contamination.
Solution: You can try categorizing rigid plastic containers such as PET, HDPE and PP to prevent cross-contamination and increase the volume of recycled resins.
5. Material Feeding
Problem: Excessive or insufficient feeding in the recycling system can reduce output efficiency.
Solution: Automatic material feeding systems can provide constant material feeding by combining a belt conveyor, screw conveyor or nip roller feeder with a plastic pelletizer. The feeding systems halt or function depending on the pelletizer load while ensuring maximum feeding efficiency.
6. Contaminated Material
Problem: Recycled pellets can be contaminated by food residue, dirt, and oil. Also, mixing different types of plastics can reduce their quality and reusable aspects. Moreover, contamination has an impact on recycling effectiveness which leads to increased waste and greater costs.
Solution: Before putting plastics into recycling machines, ensure these wastes are clean, sorted and dried.
7. Blockages and Hopper Bridging
Problem: The material blockage occurs due to improperly prepared materials or poor maintenance of machine components. It leads to the bridging of material in hopper feeding recycling machines owing to interlock or moisture, particularly for microscopic particles.
Solution: You can accurately prepare waste and use auto-feeding systems. Moreover, force feeders for recycling machines that feed from hoppers can help to prevent material bridging.
Additionally, regular inspections of machine components, frequently changing filter meshes and unclogging the die head are all simple effective techniques to solve plastic recycling problems.
8. Overheating
Problem: Overheating the plastic waste in integrated pre-conditioning equipment such as the cutter compactor and shredder or overcooking the plastic melt in the extruder can degrade the recovered pellets. This not only reduces their reuse capacity but also lowers the overall quality of the resulting plastic items.
Solution: To address the issue, set the right temperature of recycling machines which depends on the materials thereby adjusting heating and cooling elements efficiently. Use dependable components that will greatly reduce material overheating issues and do not cause temperature imbalances. Also, prevent material impediments that can reduce local clogging and overheating problems.
9. Sticky Plastic Pellets
Problem: It can be due to multiple reasons such as elevated extruder temperatures, inadequate pellet cooling and material characteristics that end up making recycled pellets stick to each other.
Solution: Ensure optimal extruder temperature settings and maintain adequate cooling water or air temperature for air-cooled machines that also dry them. You can also use a centrifuge drier. Apart from that, a chiller in warmer climates can successfully handle some of the plastics recycling issues and opportunities associated with pellet formation and quality control.
10. Hollow Plastic Pellets
Problem: Due to their low density, reduced strength, uneven size and shape they are unsuitable for plastic production. This results in inefficient manufacturing and lower product quality. Other reasons causing hollowness are inefficient degassing, plasticization, temperature and cooling water circulation speed.
Solution: Invest in vacuum degassing systems that are customized to the material condition. This will help in the efficient removal of gas that causes hollow plastic pellets problems. Achieving smooth plasticization requires continuous temperature control across particular zones of the recycling extruder and die head. This also adjusts the cooling water temperature and speed, thus making sure it is not too cold or fast.
11. Non-Uniform Pellets or Chunks
Problem: Did you know the uniformity of the final shape and size of pellets is important otherwise it impacts the quality of recycled plastic. Non-uniform pellet and chunk production is affected by feeding instability, material flow and uneven pellet output.
Solution: Most non-uniform pellet output problems can be solved by stabilizing material input. Also, maintain smooth melt flow through temperature adjustments, avoiding clogging and using an auto speed and pressure-controlled pellet cutting system. You can also prevent plastic chunk production faults with pelletizing knives such as dullness or poor disposition.
12. Global Plastic Usage
Problem: Dealing with diversified waste globally poses issues due to varying requirements and resources. Non-recyclable sachets and opposition to plastic bans add to the difficulty of waste management.
Solution: To improve the situation, instead of proposing universal bans, you can adopt targeted solutions for difficulties in plastic recycling based on geographical area. Implementation of Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) encourages manufacturers to actively address the environmental effects of their products.
13. Neglecting EPR
Problem: Some consumer packaged goods (CPG) corporations refuse to accept the responsibility for their plastic trash. This makes it difficult for new participants to join recycling efforts.
Solution: You can pinpoint producer responsibilities and the problems of fulfilling single-use plastic bottles. It may come across as a successful implementation of Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) in plastic recycling.
14. Futile Collection
Problem: Some recycling collecting bags or plastic shopping bags end up in landfills or incinerators. This raises a concern about the viability and effectiveness of recycling programs.
Solution: Understanding the intricacies of plastics recycling challenges and opportunities can improve collection systems and propose restrictions on certain materials.
15. Ineffective Management
Problem: Effectively managing plastic waste throughout its lifecycle by considering alternate options, and locations and considering the global impact leads to another challenge for the recycling process.
Solution: To overcome this challenge, you can minimize the use of virgin plastic and improve the use of post-consumer recycled materials. This can create a sustainable plastic recycling ecosystem balance between business, societal needs and natural resource preservation.
Also Read: Top 20 Waste Management Companies in USA
Why is it Difficult to Recycle Plastics?
This is due to the diverse composition of materials, costly processes and no proper recycling laws in many regions. There are limited types of plastics that are worth recycling which often results in downcycling.
For example, black plastic food trays are especially hard for machines to separate while certain plastics like LDPE require chemical recycling which is expensive and not widely available.
After learning about plastic recycling, if you’re curious about the economic viability of glass cycling, check out our blog – is glass recycling profitable?
What Percentage of Plastic is Recycled Globally?
Globally less than 10% of the 7 billion tons of plastic waste produced is recycled with a significant portion ending up in the environment for dumping. To increase plastic recycling rates difficulties that must be addressed are:
- food residue contamination,
- economic incentives that encourage new plastic manufacture,
- market fragmentation, unequal facility distribution,
- limited recycling capacity and complexity of recycling thermoset plastics.
Cross-reference: Recycling Thermosetting Plastics: Benefits And Drawbacks
Ultimately, the blog highlighted problems with recycling plastic and suggested solutions for the same to address the global challenge of managing this waste. Additionally, keeping recyclable plastics clean and exploring alternative options are among the best recycling practices to become part of the solution. For more such interesting content, keep exploring our blog posts.
