Climate Leading Process Industry's project on plastic recycling in media
In two news segments, Swedish Television (SVT) highlights the results from a plastic recycling project conducted within the Climate Leading Process Industry initiative. The results show that it is possible to break down plastic waste to the molecular level, which means that single-use plastics from healthcare, for example, can be recycled.
Martin Seeman, an Associate Professor in Energy Conversion at Chalmers University, led the project where the new method of steam cracking was tested to recycle plastics from healthcare. The waste is heated to 800 degrees Celsius, which causes the material to break down into molecules. At the same time, bacteria and other microorganisms are also killed.
“The great thing is that even infectious material is broken down,” Martin Seemann told SVT .
The molecules can then be reassembled into new products.
See SVT´s segment here (in Swedish) >>
Just over half of the total waste from hospitals is incinerated instead of being recycled in the Västra Götaland region. A large part of this consists of plastic products, and with the help of steam cracking, they hope to be able to recycle a larger proportion.
“I believe that new methods like this are very important,” says Jonna Bjuhr Männer, an environmental strategist for the region, to SVT.
See SVT´s segment here (in Swedish) >>
The project Evaluation of thermochemical recycling of disposable products from healthcare and sorted plastic-rich material streams from household waste, funded by the Climate Leading Process Industry, is behind the results. Project partners, besides Chalmers, include RISE, Borealis, Mölnlycke Health Care, Bioshare AB, Västra Götalandsregionen, and Perstorp.
Other projects within the Climate Leading Process Industry that focus on the recycling of healthcare waste include Circular flows of plastic and textiles in healthcare and Complex polymer-rich material streams and their role in a circular material supply.