Researchers pioneer new technique to convert single-use plastic waste into useful products

Researchers at the Polymer Processing Research Centre (PPRC) at Queen’s University Belfast are pioneering innovative manufacturing techniques to turn waste plastic into a wide variety of useful products.

Rotocycle is a £500,000 project funded by Innovate UK, which began in January 2019 and will last for two years.

Their ground-breaking approach involves a manufacturing process called rotational moulding, which has the potential to economically recycle very large volumes of plastic waste into a wide variety of innovative products such as urban street furniture, storage tanks and marine buoys.

Researchers of the project are working in collaboration with three industrial partners; Impact Laboratories Ltd in Scotland, Impact Recycling Ltd in England and Harlequin Plastics Ltd in Northern Ireland.

Dr Peter Martin from the School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at Queen’s, explains: “The process starts with flakes of waste plastics being separated and compounded into pellets using the patented technologies of Impact Laboratories and Impact Recycling.”

“At Queen’s we take these pellets and grind them into a fine powder, which is then blended with a proportion of new plastic (polyethylene), heated to over 200ºC and then cooled within a mould to transform it into the shape of a new product.”

Dr Martin adds: “Our research involves testing to find the optimum combination of blending the plastics and processing conditions so that eventually Harlequin Manufacturing will be able to introduce a range of new rotomoulded products made largely from post-consumer waste."

“It is expected that in one product of this kind waste plastic could replace around 30 per cent of the new plastic required and use the equivalent of 1,000 old milk bottles in its manufacture.”