#plastic-recycling

#plastic-recycling

In the plastic recycling industry, the casualties keep coming. Waste management company Biffa's Sunderland plant closed in February after opening in 2022 at a cost of 7m, while rival Viridor closed its Avonmouth plant in 2022, Skelmersdale in 2023 and confirmed this summer that its Rochester plant would close, too. Like falling dominoes, plastic recycling plant closures have been endemic across Europe too: another big name, Veolia, will close its two German operations this year, while seven plastic recyclers closed in the Netherlands last year.

Ben Gibbons, is co-founder of Circular 11, based in Christchurch, which has been running its recycling business for four years. He said it takes hard-to-recycle mixed plastics, like those found under the pitch at Wembley, and use it to make planks, which can then be used in manufacturing. "Obviously we all know that plastic waste is a big issue but we're just trying to harness that property and use it in a slightly more constructive way," Mr Gibbons said.

Most deodorant tubes are made from high-density polyethylene (HDPE or #2 plastic), low-density polyethylene (LDPE or #4 plastic), or polypropylene (PP or plastic #5), but materials may vary by brand. To make things even more complicated, many brands have a dial on the bottom of the tube that is made from a different plastic polymer than the rest of the container. The cap and protective insert may also be made of different polymers.

The agreement helps nudge the Menlo Park-based Novoloop through the so-called " valley of death " that many climate tech startups must slog through. Startups that depend on hardware are particularly susceptible to stumbling in the valley, the dreaded moment when they've proven their initial technology and have not generated sufficient revenues from selling their product. "For this product line, we have essentially achieved what would be the commercial relationship," Novoloop co-founder and CEO Miranda Wang told TechCrunch.

The process starts with polyethylene, which is the main plastic used in shopping bags. The researchers convert it into very small particles called carbon quantum dots, or CQDs. These particles are smaller than a virus, and to produce them, the team uses a combination of two methods: pyrolysis and hydrothermal treatment. Pyrolysis involves heating the plastic without oxygen, while hydrothermal treatment involves heating the material in water under pressure.