Compatibilization of polyethylene (waste) mixtures through reactive extrusion

The production of plastic materials has experienced incredible growth over the past decades. Polyethylene constitutes the largest part (25%) of plastic production, finding its application mostly as film in industrial and food packaging and agricultural use. However, since packaging materials are getting increasingly complex, polyethylene waste...

Bio-based plastics in a circular economy: A review of recovery pathways and implications for product design

Bio-based plastics are attracting increasing attention due to their perceived sustainability and circularity. While enabling circularity by using renewable feedstocks, they still contribute to plastic pollution. Furthermore, their rapidly growing market will cause bio-based plastics to constitute significant fractions of plastic waste,...

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...

Towards an environmentally sound metric to evaluate post-consumer plastic packaging waste recycling: Towards an environmentally sound metric to evaluate post-consumer plastic packaging waste recycling

In the recent years, the circular economy (CE) has emerged as an alternative to current linear economic models with prospects of achieving the decoupling of environmental impacts from economic growth. To this end, CE models focus on the permanence of products, materials, and value in the economy, eliminating as much waste as possible. In waste...

Pantai Project 2019: Research into the feasibility of a plastic recycling business on Bali, Indonesia

Every year large quantities of plastic waste accumulate in Bali’s environment. This has a negative impact on Bali’s environment, local society and its tourist driven economy. With lacking waste management facilities and local awareness plastic waste enters Bali’s rivers, through which the waste ends up in the ocean. A concept small-scale...

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...

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...

Recycling Plastics in Costa Rica: Creating Environmental Awareness through Strategic Brand and Product Design

This Master thesis shows how to create environmental awareness through the use of strategic brand and product design in the country of Costa Rica. An adaptation of the Delft Innovation Model has been constructed to determine the strategy for a new company. Using this model, the external factors (environment) can be analysed and the internal...