Resources, Conservation & Recycling 155 (2020) 104646

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Resources, Conservation & Recycling

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/resconrec

Design from recycling: A complex mixed plastic waste case study T

a, b a a c b
Kim Ragaert *, Sophie Huysveld , Gianni Vyncke , Sara Hubo , Lore Veelaert , Jo Dewulf ,
Els Du Boisc
a
Department of Materials, Textiles and Chemical Engineering, Research Group CPMT, Ghent University, Technologiepark 130, Ghent, Belgium
b
Department of Green Chemistry and Technology, Research Group STEN, Ghent University, Coupure Links 653, Ghent, Belgium
c
Product Development, Faculty of Design Sciences, University of Antwerp, Antwerp, Belgium

A R T I C LE I N FO A B S T R A C T

Keywords: With today’s continued drive to increase recycling rates of plastics, the low-hanging fruit of clean mono-streams
Mixed plastic waste of plastic waste has long since been picked. If Europe’s ambitious recycling targets are to be met, plastics waste
Design from recycling streams that have until now been labeled ‘problematic’ and have consistently been sent to incineration, must be
Mechanical recycling considered as well. One such stream is the sink fraction obtained from float-sink sorting of mixed post-consumer
Product development
packaging waste. It is a very complex stream in terms of composition. Moreover, it contains a sizeable amount of
PVC, which is considered detrimental to further mechanical recycling of any mixed plastic waste. Within the
current research, the sink fraction was extensively analyzed for composition and mechanical properties, as well
as treated for removal of PVC and non-ferrous metals. Subsequently, the Design from Recycling strategy was
applied to successfully develop a new product with this material, called the Greentile. The Greentile was ef-
fectively manufactured and found to be a useful construction element for slanted green roofs.

1. Introduction new plastics packaging by 2030. Additionally, a recent amendment to

Plastics have been identified as one of the most promising materials
to reduce the carbon footprint in Europe, alongside steel, aluminum and
cement (Material Economics, 2018). Mechanical recycling of plastic
waste is estimated to produce about 1.4 t CO2/t plastics, which is less
than 30 % of the CO2 emissions associated with making new plastics
(5.1 tCO2/t plastics) (Material Economics, 2018). Yet still, only about
30 % of all EU plastics are collected for recycling (Plastics Europe,
2018) and of these, it is estimated that only 10 % is effectively recycled
into new products.
At the same time, Europe is currently taking a political and legis-
lative lead in circularity for plastics. In 2015 the European Commission
introduced the Circular Economy Package (European Commission,
2016), which included measures that will stimulate Europe’s transition
towards a circular economy, with plastics being one of the key ele-
ments. This has since been crystallized into the Strategy for Plastics in a
Circular Economy (European Comission, 2018). Strategy targets include
55 % recycling of all plastics packaging by 2025 and recyclability of all
the Packaging and Packaging Waste directive (European Commision,
2018) has a heavy impact on how ‘recycling rates’ are allowed to be
counted. Whereas previously, governments and EPR organization could
count all the plastics that had been collected for recycling (baled after
sorting, so-called ‘exit sorting plant’), the amendment shifts this count
to those tonnages effectively going into a recycling operation, which
will be considerably less as contaminations like labels and organic
debris are still to be removed. As such, there is still much gain to be had
from increasing both quantities and qualities of recycled plastics. If
Europe’s ambitious recycling targets are to be met, we can no longer
afford to only consider the very best of waste plastics recovered for
recycling, but we must also consider more complex and challenging
plastic waste streams. One of these is the sink fraction from post-con-
sumer mixed plastic waste, which is a complex blend of PET, PS, filled
PP, PVC and a variety of minor components. The industrial sorting
process to obtain this fraction has been previously described (Ragaert
et al., 2017). In brief, the fraction is the undesired part from the flo-
tation of post-consumer mixed plastic waste, in which the unfilled

Abbreviations: ABS, poly(acrylonitrile-butadiene-styrene); EoL, End of Life; EPR, extended producer responsibility; FEM, finite element method; FTIR, Fourier
Transformed Infra-Red; GMA, glycidyl methacrylate; LCA, life cycle analysis; MDD, material driven design; MPO, mixed polyolefines; MA, maleic anhydride; NIR,
near infrared; PA, poly(amide); PBT, poly(butylene terephthalate); PC, poly(carbonate); PE, poly(ethylene); PET, poly(ethylene terephthalate); PLA, poly(lactic acid);
PMMA, poly(methyl methacrylate); POE, polyolefin elastomer; PP, poly(propylene); PS, poly(styrene); PVC, poly(vinyl chloride); SAN, poly(styrene-co-acrylonitrile);
SEBS, poly(styrene-co(ethylene-butylene-co-styrene)
⁎
Corresponding author.
E-mail address: kim.ragaert@ugent.be (K. Ragaert).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.resconrec.2019.104646
Received 30 March 2019; Received in revised form 27 November 2019; Accepted 11 December 2019
Available online 23 December 2019
0921-3449/ © 2019 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
K. Ragaert, et al.
polyolefines (PP and PE) are extracted as so-called MPO. MPO is typi-
cally recycled into outdoor furniture, enclosures, livestock stable panels
or boards for terraces (Huysman et al., 2017). The sink fraction re-
presents around 20 wt% of the total incoming mixed plastics and is
currently sent to incineration (Huysveld et al., 2019). Two components
of this sink fraction are – regardless of extrudate quality – a compli-
cation for further processing, being a contamination of non-ferrous
metals (mostly Al) and a significant amount of PVC in the polymer mix.
Aluminum would cause blockages on the extrusion equipment but can
be removed fairly straightforward via Eddy current. The PVC compo-
nent is a different story altogether. Complete removal via known se-
paration techniques (like NIR) is very challenging, as the polymer mix is
already flaked at this point (required for the earlier sink-float). Yet, the
PVC removal is an absolute condition for further processing via me-
chanical recycling. PVC is known to have poor thermal stability, de-
grading severely in the temperature range of 250−320 °C (Lopez-
Urionabarrenechea et al., 2012). During degradation, HCl is released,
which is both toxic and highly corrosive to the equipment. In the
converting of virgin PVC, this is not an issue as the PVC is processed at
relatively low temperatures (well below 200 °C) (Osswald et al., 2006),
with the addition of stabilizers and in corrosion-resistant equipment.
However, the sink fraction under investigation holds a majority of PET,
meaning that it will have to be processed at temperatures over 250 °C
for proper melting of the PET, which is quite an overheating for the PVC
component (Ragaert et al., 2017). As such, the degradation of PVC
would be accelerated, leading to even HCl development. The gas will
not only have corrosive effects on equipment and lead to a general
quality reduction of the extruded polymer, it is also a known catalyst
for the degradation of PET (Brebu et al., 2004), the majority polymer in
this very blend. Additionally, other polymers like ABS – which is a small
contamination in this mix – have been found to in turn accelerate the
degradation of the PVC by reducing the dehydrochlorination tempera-
ture (Liu et al., 2017). As such, a complex degradation interaction
would occur if the sink fraction were to be processed as such, with
ruined equipment and useless extrudate as a result.
In the current research, the sink fraction can be abstracted to be a
heavily contaminated PET stream. Specifically for the recycling of PET,
HCl has been previously identified as one of the most problematic
contaminants for recycling (Paci and La Mantia, 1998). Threshold va-
lues for PVC in recycled PET have been described as low as 100 ppm
(Paci and La Mantia, 1999) or even 50 ppm (Awaja and Pavel, 2005).
Even if the PVC were to be removed from the sink fraction, a complex
blend of different polymer types still remains. As polymers are essen-
tially immiscible, the resulting extrudate is expected to exhibit poor
mechanical properties such as brittleness (Ragaert et al., 2018). A
common approach to mitigate the immiscibility in recycled polymer
blends is the addition of compatibilizers. Typically, these additives are
comprised of a relatively non-polar backbone for dispersive interactions
with non-polar components (like PP) with grafted functional groups for
bonding or interactivity with polar components (like PET). They are
intended to reduce interfacial tension and as such improve dispersive
mixing of the different components in the blend. Typical examples of
compatibilizers include SEBS-g-MA (Dobrovszky and Ronkay, 2016;
Pracella et al., 2002; van Bruggen et al., 2016), SEBS-g-GMA (Pracella
et al., 2002; van Bruggen et al., 2016), PP-g-MA (Champagne et al.,
1999; van Bruggen et al., 2016; Wang et al., 2011, 2018) and POE-g-MA
(Kuzmanović et al., 2018; Mi et al., 2019). These are relatively ex-
pensive additives, however, with prices ranging from three- to seven-
fold those of virgin polymers. It is therefore only economical to use
them in relatively small amounts (2−5 wt%), for fear of increasing the
price of the recyclate above that of virgin polymers (Ragaert et al.,
2017).
Design from Recycling is a product development strategy (Veelaert
et al., 2017b, 2017a), strongly complimentary to the better-known
Design for Recycling, which focuses on product recyclability at EoL by
promoting easy separation of different materials and an all-round
2
Resources, Conservation & Recycling 155 (2020) 104646
efficient material use (EU, 2009). In Design from Recycling, however,
the secondary raw material is the starting point of a new product de-
velopment. Key aspects of the strategy include a thorough character-
ization of the recycled polymer, adapted product (and mould) design to
the recycled polymer’s properties and identifying acceptable (cost-ef-
fective) strategies for the upgrading of the material quality (to product
requirements) where necessary. Roughly, two approaches can be con-
sidered within Design from Recycling, namely: (i) the drop-in approach:
required material specifications are a given and the recycled material
must be upcycled up to specification, so that it can substitute virgin
polymers and (ii) the material driven design (MDD) method (Karana
et al., 2015): the properties of the recycled material are used as a
starting point for the development of a wholly new product.
Previously, this strategy has already been successfully implemented
to realize a high-quality consumer product made from the manu-
facturer’s own production waste, following the drop-in approach
(Ragaert et al., 2018).
It is the goal of the current research to apply the MDD method
Design from Recycling to develop a product, suitable for manufacture
with the challenging sink fraction but different from typical ‘bulk’ so-
lutions like outdoor furniture. To this end, the sink fraction was treated
to remove non-ferrous metals and PVC and extensively characterized in
terms of composition as well as mechanical properties. A new product
was not only developed, but an injection mould was likewise designed
and manufactured. Finally, a test series of the new product ‘Greentile’
was produced and evaluated. LCA studies for this new product have
been considered a separate study (Huysveld et al., 2019) and will be
part of the discussion rather than the focus of this manuscript.
2. Materials & methods
2.1. Materials
The used polymer waste stream is the sink fraction of a post-con-
sumer plastic waste from the Netherlands, that has been put through
the sorting process (Ragaert et al., 2017) at the plant of a typical re-
cycler (Eco-Oh!, BE). These are dominantly rigid plastics, foils tend to
remain with the float fraction, due to their large surface area. It was
delivered as washed and dried flakes sized 0−15 mm. Only flakes
larger than 4 mm were considered.
As a compatibilizer, SEBS-g-MA was used (Kraton FG1901) in a 2 wt
% dosage. It is a linear triblock copolymer with a styrene content of 30
% and grafted with 1.4–2 wt% MA.
2.2. Pretreatment
The as-delivered sink fraction was subjected to the following se-
paration treatments:
• For the removal of non-ferrous metals: three successive passages on
an Eddy current separator (CTP, BE) using a polar wheel (50 Hz,
3000 rpm), a conveyor belt (20 Hz, 0.46 m/s) and a separation
splitter at 42 °C, to remove the non-ferrous metal particles. The
setup can process 83 kg/h and yielded 1.1 wt% of mainly aluminum
particles from the sink fraction;
• For the removal of PVC: Autosort Flake system (Tomra, DE), using a
1200 mm vibrating chute combined with an ejection module with
several valves. The ultra-high resolution NIR detection system in the
electronic evaluation system directs the rejection and acceptance of
passing material particles using 4 bar compressed air at a 0.6 T/h/
1.2 m rate, which yielded 20.6 wt% assumed-PVC in the reject
section.
2.3. Compositional analysis
Identification of polymer composition in the as-delivered and
K. Ragaert, et al.
Table 1
Load cases FEM analysis on Greentile.
Load Case Description
1 Walking during installation
2 Saturated substrate, vegetation and walking
3 Saturated substrate, vegetation and snow and wind
4 Saturated substrate, vegetation and snow and wind and walking (= case 3 + walking)
pretreated mix was done by a combination of FTIR and NIR. FTIR
spectra of material flakes were obtained on the Tensor 27 FTIR device
from Brüker, equipped with an ATR crystal, using Opus 6.5 software.
Data were derived based on 16 scans, resolution 4 cm−1; in the range of
4000 cm−1 - 600 cm−1, using a KBr beamslitter, comparing spectra
with the software polymer database.
All samples were selected using the manual increment sample di-
vision technique according to standard CEN/TS 16,011: 2013. 500
sampled particles were tested for each mix (before and after sorting).
The composition of the reject (positively identified as PVC) from NIR
sorting was tested on 100 particles, to evaluate the number of false
positives in the sorting. Compositional data is represented in wt%,
which is determined by recalculated number of particles via the re-
spective polymer density.
As a final and more elaborate control, NIR spectra of every particle
in 990 g of the accept-fraction of the pretreatment were obtained by a
stationary unit, sIRo by IoSys (University of Waegeningen, NL).
2.4. Mechanical and physical properties
Mechanical properties and density were determined on injection
moulded testbars.
Injection moulding of testbars was performed on an ENGEL 80 T
machine with 800 kN clamping force and a 35 mm diameter screw with
a nozzle temperature of 250−260 °C, an injection speed of 80 mm/s,
injection pressure of 815 bar, 10 s of holding pressure of 680 bar and 30
s of cooling time in a 30 °C test-specimen mould. The material was dried
in a hot-air dryer for 2.5 h on 150 °C prior to processing. The test
specimen were dogbone shaped, following ASTM D638-14, with a
rectangular section of 4 × 6 × 35 mm³ for tensile testing and rec-
tangular bars (13 × 3 × 128 mm³) for impact testing. All samples were
conditioned at 23 ± 1 °C and 50 ± 10 % relative humidity for 48 h
prior to mechanical testing.
Following ISO 527-1:2012, tensile data were obtained using an
Instron 5565 tensile apparatus with Bluehill 2.0 software, equipped
with a 5 kN static load cell, manual clamping grips (70 mm distance)
and an extensometer type Instron 2620-602 with gauge length of 12.5
mm. Extensometer removal occurred at 2.2 % strain, testing speed was
set at 2 mm/min for initial slope and raised to 20 mm/min after re-
moval of extensometer. The modulus was determined as a segment
modulus in the 0.05 to 0.25 % strain range, the yield stress was de-
termined using the 0.2 % offset method.
Impact strength was determined on a Tinius Olsen apparatus model
503 with a pendulum of 2 J (impact speed 2.91 m/s), according to ISO
179-1:2000, on 2 mm type A- edgewise.notched specimen.
Density measurements were performed according to the ISO 1183:
2011 immersion method.
All measurements were done on a minimum of seven samples and
are reported as mean +/- standard deviation. In the SPSS 25 software,
significant differences (p < 0.05) are determined by an independent
student t-test using the 95 % confidence interval for the mean.
2.5. Product CAD design and FEM analysis
Product 3D CAD design and FEM analysis of the designed product
(Greentile) were performed in the software package Siemens NX.11. For
3
Resources, Conservation & Recycling 155 (2020) 104646
Simulated load
F = 1200N
p = 120 kg/m², F = 1200N
p = 120 + 275 kg/m²
p = 120 + 275 kg/m², F = 1200N
material assignment, a custom material was created in the database
with the experimentally-determined properties of the PVC-free sink
fraction. Different load cases were simulated, including the weight of
the saturated (by water) substrate and vegetation, the possibility of a
person walking on the green roof (during installation or maintenance)
and the effects of snow and wind. For the load of walking on the roof a
reference was set of a person of 120 kg (includes tools and safety gear)
standing on a surface area of 10 × 10 cm². For the load of the saturated
substrate (thickness 8 cm) and vegetation the load was fixed according
to data provided by the supplier of both products. This was converted to
a pressure of 120 kg/m². Wind and snow loads were fixed at 275 kg/m²
according to relevant standards (NEN, 1991a, 1991b). The settings for
the different load cases are summarized in Table 1.
All simulations were performed under three possible inclination
angles for the slanted roof: 15° (minimum inclination), 45° (frequently
used inclination) and 55° (maximum inclination for Greentile system).
There are three supports assigned to the simulated product, the first and
second being the contact area of the Greentile with the wooden support
battens, respectively in Y and Z direction and the third being the con-
tact area of the overlap between two tiles.
2.6. Injection moulding of Greentile parts
The Greentile mould was designed in-house and manufactured in
mould steel 2311 on a 1:4 scale, in order to obtain a proof-of-concept.
The scaling to smaller size was required to reduce costs and for the
mould to be useable on in-house labscale machinery. Greentile parts
were manufactured on an injection machine (Engel 80 T) with a 35 mm
diameter screw, combining the technique of intrusion with injection
moulding in order to augment the maximal volume capacity of this
small lab machine. The material was dried in a hot-air dryer for 2.5 h at
150 °C prior to processing.
8 s of intrusion at 320 rpm was followed by injection moulding in a
heated mould cavity, with two temperature profiles. Set injection
temperatures were either 260 °C (with mould temperature 40 °C) or 280
°C (with mould temperature 60 °C), with the temperature profile
ramping up to this maximum in four steps of 10 °C. Dosing speed was
320 rpm, injection speed was 50 mm/s, using a maximum injection
pressure of 1300 bar. The holding pressure for 3 s was 200 bar, the
cooling time 20 s.
3. Results and discussion
3.1. Composition of the sink fraction
The polymer particle distribution of the as-delivered sink fraction is
shown in Fig. 1 (left).
The main polymers in the as-delivered sink fraction are PET and PP
(filled – most likely talcum – so that density > 1). The remaining
fraction (‘other’) is identified as containing the polymers PMMA, PA,
ABS, SAN, PC, PBT and PLA. PET clearly dominates the mix, with filled
PP as a second-largest fraction. This is coherent with expectations based
on composition of consumer packaging other than unfilled PE and PP
(which goes to the float fraction). PET (other than bottles) is ubiquitous
in tubs and trays, while filled PP (mostly black) is typical for thermo-
formed meal trays and the PS is typical for yoghurt pots (Brouwer et al.,
K. Ragaert, et al.
Fig. 1. Polymer mass composition (wt%) of original sink fraction (left); sorting ratio of autosort low throughput sorting system (middle); polymer mass composition
of sorted sink fraction (right).
2018). The large amounts of PVC are somewhat unexpected, as not
many packaging products are still made of PVC. The PVC presence is
attributed to push-through strips (medication), non-food packaging
from import products and mis-sorting (by the consumer). The assorted
polymers in the ‘other’ fraction is likewise attributed to mis-sorting or
to less-frequently used packaging (PLA for fruits, PA for frozen goods).
It must be noted that the ‘PET’ denominator at this stage also contains
all PET-based multilayers. With PET making up over 70 wt% of the mix,
the sink fraction can be considered as a heavily-contaminated PET
stream. It will have to be processed at temperatures sufficiently high for
PET (above 250 °C), which is well above typical processing tempera-
tures for PP, PS and PVC.
Fig. 1 describes the NIR sorting of the PVC and the effect on the
overall composition. The autosort flake low throughput NIR sorting
system positively selected out 20.6 wt% as PVC particles from the as-
delivered sink fraction. Of these, only 8 % were in fact PVC flakes. The
reject fraction hence contained 92 % of non-PVC particles, a large
number of false positives, a majority of which were determined to be
PET instead. Control on a lab FTIR showed that IR libraries tend to
show PVC as a potential ‘hit’ for many of the PET flakes, due to the
automatic choice of signature peak for identification. This constitutes a
severe material loss, which was deemed inevitable to allow for suffi-
cient removal of PVC. Trials (not reported here) with less severe
scanning did not remove PVC to satisfying amounts.
This system sorted 79.4 wt% of the original sink fraction as PVC-free
particles in the accept fraction, containing however still 2.1 wt% PVC-
particles (in a batch of 500 samples) in the new mass balance of the
‘PVC-free’ sink fraction. The screening of the larger sample (990 g),
however, reduced our estimation of the remaining PVC content to 1.0
wt%.
Given the industrial nature of the case study, it was most relevant to
work with the available state of technology. As such, optimization of
this sorting pretreatment itself was not considered in-scope. Arguable,
secure setting of detection speeds and NIR camera could improve either
the precision of PVC removal (more true positives on PVC) or reduce
the secondary residue (less false postives on PVC), but this would al-
most certainly go at the expense of processing speeds (tonnes/hour), as
there is ever a trade-off between purity grade and recovery amount
(Morrish et al., 2010).
While the remaining amount of 1 wt% PVC is still significantly
Table 2
values of density, tensile modulus Et, yield strength σy, strain at break εb and impact strength for the sink fraction (SF) and compatibilized sink fraction
(SF_SEBSgMA).
material density tensile modulus Et
[g/cm³] [MPa]
SF 1.31 ± 0.01 2519 ± 300
SF_SEBSgMA 1.32 ± 0.02 2381 ± 150
4
Resources, Conservation & Recycling 155 (2020) 104646
higher than the previously recorded limit of 1 ppm, it was considered
acceptable for a trial of further processing into a product for the fol-
lowing reasons: (i) the very low thresholds of 50−100 ppm are set for
pure PET, while this blend contains a significant amount of (much more
inert) PP and (ii) it was not expected to be possible to further decon-
taminate the PVC content from the flaked mix at the time.
However, should the use of the sink fraction be established on an
industrial level, it would be recommended to further reduce PVC con-
tent. An effective way to achieve this would be not to sort on the flake
level - which is the only option on the current sink fraction - but on the
product level, as NIR is much more efficient there: both higher pro-
cessing speeds and accuracy can be achieved since an object needs only
a single scan instead of hundreds of particle scans. This would, how-
ever, require a rethinking of the current industrial line: a PVC-positive
NIR scanner (complete with vibrating belt to distribute the different
waste evenly and pressurized air for controlled ‘shoot out’) would need
to be added before grinding. If this PVC is then also sent over a separate
grinding and washing line, it could even be recovered for PVC recycling
in the construction sector (Plinke et al., 2000).
In the longer term, it is quite possible that presence of PVC in
household waste will diminish by itself, as it is in line with Europe’s
Plastics Strategy (European Comission, 2018) to harmonize the dif-
ferent types of plastics used in packaging and to phase out those plastics
that are disturbing contaminators on the recycling process of mixed
plastic waste. PVC for packaging applications would definitely be first
and foremost among these.
Until then, the current sink fraction remains available in the market.
For this manuscript, all further mention of the sink fraction pertains
to the currently sorted ‘PVC-free’ sink fraction with 1.0 wt% remaining
PVC content.
3.2. Technical quality of the sink fraction
Table 2 summarizes the density and mechanical properties of the
sink fraction ‘as is’ and with the addition of 2 wt% compatibilizer SEBS-
g-MA.
The density of the ‘as is’ sink fraction is in the range of commercial
PET densities and does not change significantly with the addition of the
compatibilizer, meaning that if this mix were to be recycled again with
density-based techniques, it would once more end up in the PET-rich
yield strength σy strain at break εb impact
[MPa] [%] [kJ/m²]
30.2 ± 4.9 2.76 ± 1.31 1.6 ± 0.5
29.6 ± 3.8 14.4 ± 12.1 5.2 ± 0.4
K. Ragaert, et al.
fraction. Somewhat surprisingly, strength properties (modulus and
yield strength) of the sink fraction are quite good and well within the
common range for virgin PET granulates (Equipolymers, 2014). Strain-
at-break is quite low for a thermoplastic polymer blend containing a
significant amount of PP (typical values range between 50–150 % for
PP) and a rather large variation in the tensile properties is noted.
However, this is typical for complex (recycled) polymer mixes (Hubo
et al., 2015), as tensile testing is quite sensitive to stress concentrators
and local inhomogeneity; an unmolten particle will change the local
stress situation and cause modified deformation and failure behaviour.
This is a flaw to be taken into account when continuing with product
design. The potential stress concentrators will also adversely affect the
impact resistance of the already quite brittle PET, as can be seen from
the relatively low impact value of 1.6 kJ/m2. This makes the material
unsuitable for products that are expected to be occasionally subjected to
sudden loads, like pallets or automotive parts.
The addition of the SEBS-g-MA is seen to significantly improve the
properties related to toughness and ductility, namely strain-at-break
and impact strength. Through compatibilization of the different frac-
tions present, the material is better able to disperse energy and forces.
This will most likely occur between the PET majority phase and the
second-largest PP phase. SEBS-g-MA is known to migrate to the inter-
face between these two components, where the SEBS backbone will
interact (dispersive forces) with the PP and the MA functional group
will either bond or interact with polar groups of PET (Razak et al.,
2013). As SEBS is a rubberlike component, the overall blend will lose
some of its stiffness. The noted reduction is not statistically significant,
however, due to the large variations on the tensile measurements.
3.3. Design from recycling with the sink fraction
3.3.1. Product type from recyclate properties
From the characterization of the pretreated sink fraction, we can
estimate the behaviour of the material in a product and situate this
previously untested blend with regard to other commonly used poly-
mers, both virgin (PP, PP talc-filled, PET) and recycled (MPO) as shown
in Fig. 2.
The properties of both the ‘as is’ and compatibilized sink fraction
fall within the broader range of virgin PET materials. PET is not often
used as a resource for other than food packaging, so the comparison to
40 % talc-filled PP, which is commonly used in e.g. automotive or
construction parts, is a more useful one. The sink fraction is somewhat
weaker than 40 % filled PP, but in the same range (or even towards
Fig. 2. Stiffness/impact property balance of the sink fraction (SF), compatibi-
lized sink fraction (SF_SEBSgMA) against common ranges for PET, PP, MPO and
talc-filled PP (Fox et al., 1997; Garbassi and Po, 2003; Lepoittevin and Roger,
2011; Maddah, 2016; Shubhra et al., 2013; Hubo et al., 2016).
5
Resources, Conservation & Recycling 155 (2020) 104646
upper end/better for the compatibilized blend) concerning impact
strength. MPO is typically a recycled material (from the float fraction),
which is typically used for garden furniture, terrace or wall panels. The
lower stiffness (lower than virgin PP) is usually compensated by man-
ufacturing bulky products. We observe that the sink fraction is sig-
nificantly stiffer than this MPO, so it could be used in similar applica-
tion perhaps, but with thinner section. The addition of the (expensive)
compatibilizer would only be warranted if the newly designed product
is expected to be subjected to impact loading.
3.3.2. Product design: Greentile
Based on the determined mechanical properties, it is decided to
develop a product where rigidity is required but at the same time the
critical load-bearing aspect of the product should be limited. The re-
lative brittleness could be compensated by going for a slightly thicker-
walled product, which will also mitigate the potential disturbance by
non-melting particles that could otherwise block the polymer flow in
the mould or be stress concentrators in the final product. Applications
requiring a high strength/weight ratio (like transportation) are there-
fore discounted, as the product will inevitably be heavier than a thin-
walled counterpart. The sector of consumer products in electric and
electronic equipment (EEE) is also discarded, as such polymers typically
require more impact resistance.
For the sink fraction, the building & construction (B&C) sector was
determined as most suitable. The size of the products is often larger
than other sectors and wall thickness often not critical. This gives en-
ough freedom to design the product to achieve the desired strength and
durability. We aim for a relatively thick-walled product (6 mm) that is
subjected to small loads only. The thick wall section is meant to in-
crease strength and to buffer any unmolten particles. The product must
be suitable for mass production but not fall under bulk solutions (ty-
pically 100−300 mm thickness).
All of these criteria come together in the Greentile product, a roof
tile for slanted green roofs on domestic residences or small sheds. An
increasing popularity of green roofs is underpinning the market value of
this product. Advantages of green roofs are including benefits for re-
ducing air pollution in densely populated cities alone, alternative
manner of cooling, contribution to the environment and the quality of
life in many different ways (Blank et al., 2013). Roof tiles for flat green
roofs currently exist in the market and are often made from recycled PP
or MPO, as they have very limited load bearing function if any at all.
Inclined green roofs are far more challenging, both from a construction
perspective (support, positioning, attachment, water management) and
in terms of material properties (sufficient strength for ‘hanging’ under
inclination and load variation dry-wet). The rooftile for inclined green
roofs in itself is innovative as a product and the required material needs
to be stronger than typical PP or MPO, while impact requirements are
limited, which makes the cheap ‘as is’ sink fraction (no compatibilizer
added) a suitable candidate.
The geometry of the new Greentile product is shown in Fig. 3, with
an indication of its most prominent features. The outer dimensions are
369 × 349 × 100 mm3, which is similar to common roof tiles, so that
one could replace a regular slanted roof with a Greentile roof without
having to adjust he support batten structure.
Inside the Greentile a grid of ribs (1) is placed, with three different
functionalities. Firstly, the grid serves to increase the stiffness and
strength of the rooftile, as well as its creep resistance. During the life-
time of the product, the Greentile is subjected to constant loading from
the substrate and vegetation, under which it is not allowed to fail. The
second function is water storage. The ribs form individual pockets
where water can be collected and contained. These water reserves can
be used by the vegetation during dryer periods.
The retaining wall (2) at the bottom end of a Greentile is meant to
shore up the substrate and vegetation, even under high roof inclina-
tions. This feature creates individual ‘shoring sections’ when placed on
the roof, which means that one tile only needs to retain the weight of
K. Ragaert, et al. Resources, Conservation & Recycling 155 (2020) 104646

Table 3
Summary of the resulting maximum stress (σ) and displacement (d) values for
FEM of four load cases. Conclusions are either OK (=Resulting stress is below
yield stress, no further action needed) or NOK (Resulting stress exceeds yield
stress, action needed).
Load case Inclination (°) d (mm) σ (N/mm²) Conclusion

1 15 1,0 33 NOK
45 0,9 53 NOK
55 0,9 57 NOK
2 15 0,9 20 OK
45 0,7 16 OK
55 0,6 13 OK
3 15 0,2 6,1 OK
45 0,4 6,3 OK
55 0,5 6,4 OK
4 15 0,9 20 OK
45 0,7 16 OK
55 0,6 13 OK
Fig. 3. design of the Greentile with marked features.

the substrate placed in that tile. This spreads the forces over the in-
dividual tiles, making it possible to optimize the amount of material
needed to produce one tile.
Underneath the retaining wall, a groove (3) is added to ensure
drainage of excess water during rainfall. The water is meant to cascade
from tile to tile, while draining via the substrate. This creates a buffer,
releasing the water slowly and steadily during pouring rains, ensuring
the substrate and vegetation are not oversaturated with water.
To protect the underlying roof from the vegetation roots, a double
edge is created with a root barrier (4). This makes it less likely that
roots would grow through the tiles, thus reducing the risk of roof
leakage and protecting the vapor barrier from root penetration.
A linear tolerance (5) of 20 mm was added to facilitate the place-
ment of the Greentile. This tolerance compensates for minor mistakes in
the placement of the support structure and makes it possible to adjust
the overall length of an entire row of Greentiles according to the length
of the roof structure. On the bottom of the product a reinforced rib (6) is
added. This is how the Greentile hooks to the underlying batten con-
struction, as the rib forms an anchor point for the tiles onto the wooden
battens. Finally, the Greentile was designed with large rounded corners Fig. 4. FEM analysis of load case 4, 15°. Maximum displacement (mm) is 0,9
(7). This facilitated the flow of the polymer, making the product easier mm around the contact of the foot.
to injection mould. More importantly, it prevents stress concentrations
in the product, that might give rise to brittle fracture. Also, a mass of temporary stresses up to maximum 20 MPa, still well below the yield
saturated substrate will be unable to grip in the sharp corners when it limit. The load of walking on the roof during installation (case 1),
expands during freezing weather. These big rounded corners provide an however, would be an issue. This is due to the fact that the area of the
upwards force when the mass would expand, protecting the tile from worker’s boot would only come into contact with the top surface of the
cracking. ribs and is therefore distributed over a very small surface area. This
issue worsens with increasing roof inclination. In practice, this could be
3.3.3. FEM analysis solved either by working in such a progressive fashion that workers
To ensure the durability and strength of the Greentile, FEM simu- needn’t walk on the ‘naked’ tiles or by first adding the substrate in the
lations were done during the design process. These simulations were system before walking on the roof. This would cause the load of walking
performed under various inclination and load situations including on the roof to be distributed over a larger surface area, a situation
walking, substrate mass, wind and snow. The results are summarized in which is overestimated (the newly deposited substrate/vegetation is not
Table 3. The results are shown in Fig. 4 for the load case 4 (15°), which saturated) by the problem-free case 2.
is representative for walking on a saturated substrate, with additional It was concluded that the Greentile was strong enough to go forward
wind and snow loads. It can be noted that the load from snow and wind with mould development.
is negligible to that of the walking human, as the resulting deflections
and stresses do not vary significantly from those obtained in case 2, 3.4. Production and evaluation of Greentile
with only the human walking as an added load.
It was concluded that the Greentile was strong enough to go forward The sink fraction was used for the production of Greentiles (scale
with mould development. All observed deformation remained below an 1:4), initially at temperature profile ‘260′. To be able to fill the com-
acceptable value of 1 mm maximum. For the static load situations (case plete cavity with the 80 T lab-scale injection machine, a combination of
2 and 3), the resulting stresses are considerably beneath the worst-case intrusion and injection moulding was used, which would be un-
yield limit of 25 MPa. The highest stress and deformation levels were necessary under industrial production circumstances. Therefore, one
observed for the low inclination situation (15°), which is the most un- should be careful with extrapolating our production experiences from
common roof inclination. From load case 4, it can be seen that walking the lab. In general, it was observed that the sink fraction is quite sen-
on the roof for maintenance will not cause the system to fail either, with sitive to processing temperatures. An initial temperature profile was set

6
K. Ragaert, et al.
at 260 °C, which is near to common temperatures for PET (265−300
°C). It was observed that the internal layer of the Greentile still con-
tained unmolten particles, which upon control were identified to be
PET. These unmolten PET particles hindered the effective flow of the
molten polymer stream, preventing a complete fill of the part in many
cases and often blocking the nozzle and sprue. This effect is mainly
attributed to the specific lab-based production process itself. With
conventional injection moulding, the polymer has a certain residence
time in the screw, while the previous part cools. In our lab setup,
however, the necessary preliminary intrusion step is quite fast, feeding
the material directly into the mould. There is no stationary time in the
heated screw and not all polymer is molten. A better flow of the molten
polymer stream was achieved by widening the injection nozzle (to-
gether with the sprue), from just under 2 mm–9 mm in diameter. A
thicker passage insulated the heat better into the melt and if any par-
ticles do remain unmolten, they will be able to flow through. It was
then possible to injection mould a satisfactory product. This specific
issue should be resolved when moving on to industrial production on a
larger machine, where conventional injection moulding can be applied.
As an alternative method to achieve better melting of all particles, a
trial was done at higher injection temperature (280 °C). Despites re-
sulting in a more homogeneous melt, flashing was present on the sur-
face of the entire Greentile part, mostly concentrated at the sprue. The
part showed a dark colour, had a brittle appearance and featured a
homogenous melt with a distinct layered build, constituted of a foamed
core and a brittle shell region, all features hinting at the presence of
degradation and at the production of volatile components. It is surmised
that the remaining PVC content effectively degraded at these tem-
peratures, causing degradation and devolatilization. Hence, the tem-
perature profile of 280 °C was abandoned.
Produced Greentiles were used to construct a slanted green roof in a
small-scale test setup. This was constructed with the traditionally used
wooden support battens, which serve as the anchors for Greentile
system. The inclination of the roof structure could also be changed
between the very gentle case of 15° and the higher value of 45°; for the
initial test this was fixed at intermediate value 25°. In Fig. 5 the process
of installing the Greentiles can be seen. First the Greentiles are placed
on the roof construction. This is done in a wave like pattern. Once the
Greentiles are placed on the test setup, substrate was added in the
system (8−10 cm) and finally the vegetation carpets are rolled out.
The system was left to itself and the elements for three months. It
was set up in a sunny, unprotected position in an open grass field in
Ghent, Belgium. No water or nutrients were added before or during the
trial period. After three months, it could be seen that the vegetation is
in excellent health and is in fact blooming (Fig. 5).
In a separate study (Huysveld et al., 2019), LCA was conducted on
the Greentile, comparing the scenarios of (i) recycling the sink fraction
into the Greentile versus incineration of the sink fraction and (ii)
Greentile production in sink fraction versus Greentile production in
Fig. 5. Overview of the construction of the Greentile slanted roof. From left to right: construction of support battens, placement of roof tiles, filling with substrate,
adding of vegetation and greenroof after three months.
7
Resources, Conservation & Recycling 155 (2020) 104646
virgin PP. The mixed household waste was considered as burden-free
up to the gate of the recycler. From there on, all process flow steps
(sink-float, different sorting steps on sink, drying, injection moulding,
etc) were included. In both comparisons, a clear environmental benefit
was observed when producing the Greentile in the sink fraction. Even
with the energy consumption of the necessary decontamination steps
and the relatively high contribution of injection moulding, this open-
loop recycling of the sink fraction is preferable. Moreover, it allows for
continued circularity of this challenging plastic waste fraction instead
of a one-time linear end in incineration.
While it would also be of interest to be able to compare the
Greentile to similar B&C products (be they in plastics or other mate-
rials), it is not possible to make a scientifically sound comparison. They
cannot be compared to current green roof tile-based solutions, as in-
sufficient public data is available regarding their material sourcing,
production process and geometry. They can also not be compared to
existing rooftiles (mostly ceramic) for slanted roofs, as these do not
incorporate the green roof functionality and are therefore a different
type of product.
An exploratory market study of the Greentile concept was per-
formed, defining the beach head target group, the market protentional
and the competitivity of the market. The beach head target group was
set to be professional green roof installers. The potential market turn-
over was evaluated at 2,6 million euro within Belgium, with increasing
potential to go international. The business model used for this study
was based on an online resale platform combined with just in time
deliveries and waste (trimmings) collection to be used as raw material
for new Greentiles. The market was evaluated and was found to be a
low-competitive market. Only two companies are found offering similar
systems for inclining green roofs: the German based Optigrün
(Optigrün, 2018) system and the Groendakpan (Groendak, 2018) based
in The Netherlands. The Greentile system was evaluated to require a
retail price of €50/m² to be profitable, making it at least €12/m²
cheaper than the closest competition.
With regard to environmental benefits, it is not straightforward to
accurately compare the Greentiles to conventional rooftiles, as the
former serve more than just the function of covering a roof.
Nonetheless, an exploratory LCA was performed to compare the
Greentile – as a construction product – to a conventional clay rooftile.
In this LCA the carbon footprint of the tile production was calculated.
For the Greentile, this was calculated according to the methodology
described by Huysveld et al. (Huysveld et al., 2019). The carbon foot-
print per kg clay rooftile was obtained from the ecoinvent v3.4 data-
base. Table 4 shows the results of the calculation, continuing from the
carbon footprint per kg to an equivalent value for one square meter of
roof. This is calculated with the full size of the Greentile (not the scale
model) and includes the effects of the recycling process.
The largest contributor to the footprint of both systems is the pro-
duction stage. From this exploratory calculation, the carbon footprint of
K. Ragaert, et al.
Table 4
Results of the comparative LCA between Greentile and conventional clay rooftiles.
Carbon footprint [kg CO2 equiv.] Surface size/tile [mm2]
Greentile 0,687 369*346
Clay rooftile 0,358 310*252
the Greentile is very similar to the conventional clay rooftile. However,
this does not take into account the benefits obtained by giving the re-
cycled plastics an alternative destination to incineration.
Furthermore, some additional critical notes deserve to be made with
regard to these comparison, being that (a) the comparison only takes
into account production and not transportation (wherein the clay tile is
heavier), (b) the calculation assumed a single-cavity injection moulding
of the Greentile, which is less energy-efficient than multi-cavity injec-
tion and (c) the added function of greenroofing is not yet included.
As such, we expect that a more elaborate comparison would result
quite decisively in favour of the Greentile.
The relevance of the sink fraction as a currently untapped resource
for plastics is high: it is a sizeable share of the mixed post-consumer
plastic waste and current end-of-life options are usually incineration.
Furthermore, the amount collected of such waste is expected to increase
in future as ever more ambitious collection and recycling goals are to be
realized (European Commission, 2018). Some countries, like Belgium,
are currently expanding their kerbside collection systems to include all
postconsumer packaging waste (Coberec-Go4Circle, 2018), while other
countries like The Netherlands and Germany already have this in place.
Additionally, the separate collection of plastics at recycling parks
steadily increases as well. This too, is a complex mix of all common
plastics.
It will depend largely on the sorting/recycling systems in place how
this potential sink fraction will be handled. On the one hand, there are
those recyclers who rely on a fully mechanical separation line, yielding
the ‘float’ and ‘sink’ fraction as described earlier (Ragaert et al., 2017).
On the other hand, there are those current systems for food packaging
sorting which are mostly NIR-based and to date focus on the recovery of
PET bottles (3 colours), HDPE and sometimes PP as well (Ragaert et al.,
2017). Specifically for the current roll-out of the expanded (the so-
called P + MD) kerbside collection in Belgium, it has now been spe-
cified that sorters receiving the mixed plastic waste must sort out the
plastics into 11 different fractions, all of them aimed at being as much
as possible mono-materials (FostPlus, 2019). The sorting companies
involved are currently adapting their existing sorting lines, amongst
other to sorting out also PET trays, PS and foils (Indaver, 2019).
Especially the positive sorting of PET trays would be of relevance to the
composition of the remaining residue, which would be the basis for a
future sink fraction from this stream. It can be expected that for sink
fraction from this source, PET (and PS) content would be severely re-
duced and PP content (which is the majority in non-sorted black plas-
tics) would rise, which would be to the benefit of the thermal stability
(vis-à-vis PVC contamination) of the blend. At the same time, overall
tonnages of the sink fraction would be expected to be reduced, given
the more rigorous positive sorting of most plastics. As such, the current
solution for the challenging sink fractions might become obsolete or at
least less pressing in terms of enormous volumes.
On the other hand, this increased sorting would only be applied to
packaging waste; mixed plastic waste from recycling parks (thus con-
taining all other plastics) is currently expected to continue ‘as is’ and
will still go to the sink-float based type of plant. If such lines were to be
upgraded for the selective removal of PVC (as described in earlier dis-
cussion), much gain could be achieved with regard to the recovery of
higher quality sink fraction.
Finally, it is entirely possible that PVC could eventually be banned
as a packaging material, as the recently published EU Plastics Strategy
(European Commission, 2018) literally mentions that ‘substances
8
Resources, Conservation & Recycling 155 (2020) 104646
Mass/tile [kg] Mass/m2 [kg] carbon footprint/m2 of roof [kg CO2 equiv.]
1,9 22,5 15,46
2,8 45,0 16,11
hampering recycling processes (will) have been replaced or phased out’.
In the meanwhile, Design from Recycling is a clever potential so-
lution for the sustainable valorization of these materials.
4. Conclusions
In this research, the complex sink fraction of post-consumer
packaging waste has been extensively characterized. This waste stream
is typically bound for incineration. It was found to be a PET-dominated
mix, contaminated with nearly 10 wt% PVC and some non-ferrous
particles. Sorting steps were undertaken to remove these troublesome
contaminations, after which the Design from Recycling strategy was
applied to develop a suitable product to manufacture in the sink frac-
tion. This product, the so-called Greentile, is a robust construction
element for slanted green roofs. FEM analysis was conducted to ensure
sufficient strength of the design and a prototype mould was made for
the production of a test series of Greentile products. A small greenroof
was successfully built and evaluated with these Greentiles.
With regard to the processing of the sink fraction, both the complex
composition and the remaining PVC content of the mix remain a point
of attention and might inhibit large-scale adoption of this material.
Nonetheless, the Greentile is a case study of how even challenging
recycled plastics can be valorized. It is the first known valorization –
other than incineration – for this challenging plastic waste.
Acknowledgements
The authors were financially supported by Flanders Innovation and
Entrepreneurship Agencywithin the TETRA-IWT project “Design from
Recycling” (150151). The authors wish to acknowledge dr. Ulphard
Thoden van Velzen (Wageningen University) for his contribution to the
extensive NIR analysis, MSc Karen Van Kets (Ghent University) for her
help with the analysis of the materials, mr. Marcel Moerman (Ghent
University) for his assistance with the mould design, mr. Mustafa Erkoç
(Ghent University) for his assistance with the injection moulding and
the companies ECO-oh! and SUEZ for the materials and discussion.
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