Plastic Recyclers Europe finds degradable plastics from Southern Europe deplete film quality

Recycled film quality negatively affected by degradable plastics from Southern Europe

Plastics Recyclers Europe has warned of increasing contamination of recyclate with degradable plastic, from waste streams in Southern Europe.

It said a trial with 1000 tonnes of equally purchased qualities of waste from Northern Europe and Southern Europe suppliers showed substantial quality discrepancies in the recycled film.

Waste streams in the South of Europe pose a quality issue in films with recycled content production due to a higher share of degradable plastics, which cause holes and speckling in film made from recyclate. The tests were performed on industrial lines to first produce recycled plastics and then to convert into a film of 50-micron thickness.

Abrasions of the supply lines turned out to be a useful indicator since they are batch-independent and thus could be used as a statistical average. To understand the defects and ruptures of the film, samples were analysed by IR, thermal analysis as well as via gas chromatography mass spectrometry.

These analyses demonstrated that most of the degradation is coming from substances used in production of degradable plastics: starch, polylactide (PLA) and polybutylene adipate terephthalate (PBAT).

These tests show that there is a big impact on the functionality of recycled plastics coming from Southern Europe waste films flows. Therefore, it is necessary to develop separate streams not only for bio-waste but also degradable plastics in order to make sure that degradable plastics do not enter waste streams of conventional plastics.