Uncovering Hidden Flows of Plastic: Landscaping the Plastic Waste Management System of City in the Global South - A Case Study of Chennai, India

Mountains of solid waste in landfills and rivers of plastic in oceans have become a symbol of modern society, more so in developing countries.<br/><br/>Asia is responsible for 71% of the world’s mismanaged plastics (Neo et al., 2021) with India ranking 12th in the world (Shanker et al., 2022). In contrast, several studies have determined that...

Wave breaking induced drift: An experimental and theoretical prediction in deep-water waves

Accurately predicting the surface transport in the ocean is crucial for estimating the course of marine pollution, which is considered one of the most pressing environmental issues of the 21st century. In the ocean, floating marine pollution is transported by several mechanisms, including waves. Current models predicting the surface transport...

Numerical investigation of plastic fragment accumulation against a sluice gate

The ramifications of plastic pollution on the environment are becoming increasingly serious in various forms throughout the world. In this context, rivers are the most important suppliers of plastics entering the marine environment. However, rivers that contain high loads of plastic waste also directly harm the livelihoods of people living near...

Macrolitter in Groyne Fields: Short term variability & the influence of natural processes

Plastic pollution and accumulation in the riverine environment is of increasing concern. While most research focuses on microplastic contamination, the dynamics of macrolitter remain largely unknown. Large scale riverbank monitoring initiatives in the Netherlands reveal that macrolitter hotspots occur at several locations. Unfortunately, current...

Simulation of the interception of plastic fluxes in rivers

One of the preferred features of plastic is its high durability. This merit is its main disadvantage in the natural environment. When poorly disposed of, plastic waste can enter rivers from surface waters and subsequently end up in the ocean. Here, plastic spreads out over the entire ocean and ultimately ends in ocean gyres....

Reuse of plastic as a building product: Recycling plastic waste into a low-cost building component for internally displaced persons (IDP) camp resettlement housing in Nigeria

This report encompasses a graduation project submitted to fulfil the requirements for the title of Master of Science at the Faculty of Architecture and the Built Environment, Delft University of Technology. This research was conducted to find an alternative use for waste plastic as building components, specifically for the residents of an IDP...

The sound of plastic: A proof-of-concept for detecting suspended riverine macroplastics with echo sounding

Plastic pollution in aquatic ecosystems is a global problem. Rivers transport large quantities of litter from land to the oceans. Plastics of different sizes and properties are widely present at various locations in river systems. Concerning macroplastics, previous studies mainly focussed on floating plastics, however, substantial parts of the...

Below the surface: A laboratorial research to the vertical distribution of buoyant plastics in rivers

Rivers are identified as main sources of plastic litter in oceans. About 65% of the plastic litter is buoyant in fresh waters, meaning it has the capability to float, making transport over rivers relatively easy. A better understanding of how plastic litter is transported via rivers is crucial. Both for quantification and mitigation of the...

Transition of the mixed plastic household waste value chain: Almere as case in a multi-level analysis on innovation in the niche of recycling mixed plastics

Packaging plastics account for the majority of the household waste plastics. These plastics can be divided into a number of types of plastics, namely PET, HDPE, LDPE, PP, PS, EPS and others. However, many plastic packages consist of different types of plastics and are often contaminated, therefore these plastics end up in the mixed plastics....

Design for the urban mine: Utilizing high purity reycled monostreams from household plastic waste for injection moulding

Plastic is a material that has greatly improved well being for the masses. However, it also contributes significantly to pollution of the natural environment and depletion of natural resources. So far only a small percentage of plastic is recycled and used for the production of new products. Inferior material quality and the inability to make a...

Introducing a recycled building component: A first step towards sustainable and adequate informal housing in South Africa

This research focuses on the unofficial neighbourhoods on the boarders of South African Cities. The informal settlements are quickly built by unskilled hands on foreign land without any form of planning, supervision or legislation. The self-constructed houses lack of daylight, ventilation and water tightness. This results in poor, unsafe and...

DGTL festival a circular festival by 2020: Plastic from waste to resource at DGTL festival, while exploring the potential effects outside the festival context.

Festivals are a growing trend, and although being a temporary event, most festivals have vast material flows with a large negative impact on the environment. The Dutch festival Lowlands, a three-day event, for example uses 300.000 kwh of electricity generated by diesel-fuelled generators, 10.000 m3 water and 500.000 kg of solid waste (Amsterdam...

ReFAB: Urban Mining MakerSpace in Marineterrein Amsterdam

Objective of the project is the design of a generic, local-based manufacturing facility, ReFab, which is constructed from salvaged materials and operates through collective effort and interactive cultivation in the employment of refuse as raw material input in advanced production processes. These disposed elements can, if elaborated in proper...

The Filament Factory: Building from Waste

Chicago is the third largest city in the US, but is also in the bottom 10 worst recycling cities. Building on the research done to revitalize old industrial area's of Chicago, the "Filament Factory" is a building that takes an active step to rethinking the way plastic is used and recycled. Today over 61% of plastic is dumped on landfills where...

Community Plastics: Designing community products by recycling locally collected plastic waste

Community Plastics is a neighbourhood initiative in which plastic waste from households is collected and recycled into small and simple products for the public spaces in the neighbourhood. Examples are street signs, birdhouses, planters and furniture. By turning the plastic waste into valuable products it becomes clear that plastic is more than...

Research on the development of a "Glass Fiber Reinforced Polyester" (GRP) facade with integrated operable GRP window frames

The goal of this research is to achieve the development of an integrated GRP façade system with operable windows where only two main materials (GRP and Glass) will be used. The design of the windows should obtain a high degree of integration and the entire façade should exhibit better performance values in several aspects over traditional façade...