(391c) Estimating Plastic Flows in the U.S.: Processes for Recycling PET

Post-consumer use plastic can be employed as a feedstock in chemical processes, but first one needs an understanding of the amount and purity of these recycle streams. The same information supports the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s report on Advancing Sustainable Materials Management: Facts and Figures. This report includes information on municipal solid waste (MSW) generation, recycling, composting, combustion with energy recovery, and landfilling. Plastics have been identified as key components in post-consumer material flows and worthy of tracking. In this effort throughputs for material recovery facilities (MRFs) around the country are identified with the intent of modeling input-output flows. Polyethylene terephthalate (PET) is a plastic of particular interest because it is the most widely recycled. PET is used in plastic bottles, thermoforms for food packaging, carpeting, and textiles, but only PET bottles are regularly recycled. Post-consumer PET flows through MRFs and specific recycling processes. These processes use resources and produce environmental releases, which along with the recycled flow amounts and purities describe the PET recycling system, finally leading through chemical engineered conversion into recycled PET products. This system has the potential to provide an example of a circular economy, where materials are kept in use and only downcycled as appropriate.

The views expressed in this presentation are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the views or policies of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.