TOMRA LEADS EBOOK

CIRCULAR ECONOMY The viability of using 100% recycled plastics

 • Good reasons for manufacturing HIGH-QUALITY RECYCLED PLASTIC GOODS
• Opportunity to profit from CONSUMERS’ CONCERNS about waste

CONTENT • Why PET BOTTLES AND PET TRAYS should be recycled, not downcycled
• TOMRA’S LOD AND SHARP EYE TECHNOLOGIES make the crucial difference

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TECHNICALLY POSSIBLE, ECONOMICALLY WORTHWHILE
The recycling industry is now proving it is technically possible
and economically worthwhile to produce goods from 100%
recycled plastic. New technologies are also challenging previous
assumptions that recycled materials must necessarily be of
inferior quality. This means there will be profitable commer-
cial opportunities for manufacturers of plastic products and
packaging to make greater use of recycled plastics. Interna-
tional initiatives to establish a circular economy – improving
the ways we recover and restore products and components
made of all materials, not only plastics – bring another
opportunity: at a time when consumers are increasingly
horrified by images of plastic waste piling-up at landfill sites
and drifting in our oceans, brands can demonstrate corpo-
rate social responsibility and build customer loyalty. A 2015
study by Nielsen shows that 66% of all consumers and 73%
of millennials are willing to spend more on a product if it
comes from a sustainable brand.
The scale of the plastic problem is enormous. According to
the Ellen MacArthur Foundation, which “works to inspire a
generation to re-think, re-design and build a positive future
circular economy,” only 14% of plastic packaging is currently
recycled, with 40% going to landfill and 32% dumped in the
environment and oceans. Even Europe, which prides itself
on being at the forefront of environmental responsibility,
recycles less than 30% of the 25m tonnes of plastic its
citizens discard every year. Regulators, like consumers, see
the need for change. The European Parliament’s environ-
mental targets for 2030 aim to “protect the planet, defend
our citizens and empower our industries” and will include a
Europe-wide strategy on plastics. And the Chinese National
Sword regulation, which has almost completely halted ex-
ports of waste to China, has woken-up nations around the
world to the need to improve domestically-based recycling
rates.
Pressure from regulators and consumers will encourage invest-
ment and innovation in recycling, but more can be done right
now to take advantage of technologies which already exist
– highly capable technologies which allow recycled materials
to be used instead of virgin plastics by adopting best-practice
in sorting, washing, extrusion and decontamination of plastics
waste. But there are widespread misconceptions about what
may or may not be achievable. 3
RECYCLING
MORE PET
One of the largest misconceptions about reusing
plastics concerns polyethylene terephthalate (PET),
a material widely used because of its strength,
thermo-stability, transparency, light weight, low
cost, and recyclability. It is well known that many
products made of PET can be recycled, including
drink bottles and plastic food jars. But it is not yet
widely understood that new technologies also
make it possible for PET trays to be sorted from
waste for recycling. Although there is already
some success in recycling plastics, outcomes are
disappointingly limited.
Deposit schemes designed to encourage the return
of plastic bottles can result in like-for-like recyc-
ling, with the plastic used again to make bottles.
But the return of other PET products and PET
packaging for re-use as rPET currently results in
downcycling into inferior-quality products. This
is an easy option but lacks necessary ambition
because the practice of downcycling plastics is not
sustainable.
PET bottle recycling has developed massively over
the last 30 years and there is no reason why the
same cannot be done to manufacture other PET
products, and PET trays in particular, from 100%
recycled materials. This makes sense environmen-
tally and commercially.
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 Municipal Solid
TOMRA’S
TECHNOLOGIES
Two material detection technologies recently introduced
by TOMRA, SHARP EYE and Laser Object Detection,
demonstrate the significant progress being made towards
100% recyclability.
TOMRA SHARP EYE technology, which uses a new optical
sensor for higher light intensity, can distinguish the small
chemical differences between trays and bottles made from
PET so that they can be separated for equivalent-product
recycling. The key to this breakthrough is TOMRA’s
FLYING BEAM® technology, the best sensor technology on
the market. As the first near-infrared (NIR) scan system
with point-scanning (and no need for external lamps),
this focuses only on the area of the conveyor belt being
scanned. Allowing a wide range of calibration possibilities,
ET Trays
W vs. P
e s
as
l
ott
te
PET B
this can distinguish fine molecular differences in materials
flowing down the line.
The step-by-step process which concludes with the
separation of single-layer PET trays from PET bottles is
seamless and flexible. During the preparation for sorting
mixed plastics into different polymers, packaging material
collected or pre-sorted from municipal solid waste (MSW)
first runs through a mechanical treatment process which
reduces voluminous materials, mainly soft items such as
plastic, film, and non-plastic products. To then separate
mixed PET into different polymers, TOMRA’s AUTOSORT
machine functions as a combined system, detecting
material and colour in combination with grain size. Even
with a very mixed input, this process achieves a sorting
Packaging
efficiency of 95% or greater. Laser Object Detection (LOD)
sorts materials according to their spectral and spatial
characteristics, detecting material that near infra-red
(NIR) technology is incapable of identifying. This enables
recycling systems to more efficiently remove any impu-
rities and decontamination, meaning that it is technically
possible and economically worthwhile to produce goods
from 100% recycled materials. LOD is used in combination
with TOMRA’s AUTOSORT and FINDER machines to boost
the circuit’s sorting capabilities, enabling waste and scrap
recycling operations to reach final product purity levels not
previously attainable.
Watch the SHARP EYE video
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AN IMPORTANT PART OF
A BROADER SOLUTION
“ TOMRA’s sorting technologies are of environmental and
economic importance because they can help significantly
improve recycling rates. To complement this, product
designers and manufacturers are now beginning to think
more carefully about their products’ end-of-life recyclabi-
lity. Consumers now think about, and our natural environ-

”
ment urgently needs, this. It is together that we can really
make a difference.

Tom Eng
Senior Vice President and Head of TOMRA Sorting Recycling

Recycling is just one of the practical solutions to the world’s wor-

sening resource crisis. It is also necessary to alter the ‘throw-away’
design approach to consumer goods, so that resources are kept
in use for as long as possible, before recovering and regenerating
products and materials at the end of their service life.

CHECK OUT
OUR VIDEO SITE

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Recycling Headquarters
Germany
TOMRA Sorting GmbH
Phone: +49 2630 9652 0
Fax: +49 2630 9652 101
recycling-sorting@tomra.com
Brazil
TOMRA Brasil Ltda
Phone: +55 11 3476 3500
Fax: +55 11 3294 3400
info-brasil@tomrasorting.com
www.tomra.com/recycling
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