Page 59 - Plastics News Issue - January 2025
P. 59
IN THE NEWS
Innovative Plastic Recycling
Technologies Transforming Waste Management
liarities of the solutions under consideration, it is
pertinent to begin by giving one a foretaste of
the daunting task that is managing plastic waste.
Plastics are manufactured products which origi-
nate from petrochemicals and they are a com-
mon feature in most societal use since they are
cheap, durable and are versatile in use. But on
the same note, these properties that make them
easy to use also make it so difficult to dispose
the same products.
The types of plastics that manufacture occupy
iffusion of plastics is among the most majority are considered to take time of up to 500
significant problems that the society years to degrade and are not biodegradable. A
Dhas faced in the current age. Every year United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP)
many tons of plastic wastes are chucked to the report gives a projection that approximately 8
landfills, seas, oceans, and any natural system million tons of plastic is dumped into the seas
with enduring negative impacts on people and every year and affect life and ecosystems. On
the environment. Traditional methods for deal- land, eradicating the plastics meant burning or
ing with plastics have been in the market for throwing them in the dumps with the intention of
several years now but advances in technology allowing the plastics to emit toxic substances to
is providing new means of dealing with it. These the soil and the aerial atmosphere.
innovations are not only designing solutions in
relation to the escalating motion of plastics, but A major issue that contributes to the inefficient
they are generating novel opportunities for sus- recycling process of traditional plastic recy-
tainability and recovery of raw materials. clers is the type of plastic accepted by the facil-
ity, non-recyclable material that is often found
Therefore, in this article, the reader will be pre- mixed with the plastic and lack of proper infra-
sented with insight into modern approaches to structure. Often, plastic waste is, at best, down-
recycling plastics, as well as demonstrations of cycled, a process through which it is recycled to
how each technology functions, its application, make materials of lower quality that cannot be
strength, and role in advancing a circular econ- employed in products with great value-adds. It
omy. so means that the actual amount of the plastic
waste that gets recycles is almost minimal and
The Plastic Crisis: A Growing Challenge
the rest is either dumped in the landfills or incin-
However, to appreciate the novelties and pecu- erated.
January 2025 PLASTICS NEWS 59
