WASTE PLASTICS RECYCLING A GOOD PRACTICES GUIDE

BY AND FOR LOCAL & REGIONAL AUTHORITIES

The costs of such activities can be minimised by requesting and accepting only certain agricultural
films and only those films which are brushed and dried.
Table 22: Cost of Activities (/tonne)
Collection
Sorting
Processing
BEP
Plastretur (NOR)

120

Transport

TOTAL
142

220

PVC Pipes
The pipe recycling scheme organised by FKS in The Netherlands is based on a neighbourhood and
container park collection system. PVC pipes are accepted along with PE and PP and therefore
processing costs includes the manual sorting of the polymer and large contaminant removal.

FKS (NL)

Table 23: Cost of Activities (/tonne)

Collection
Sorting
Processing
100
500

Transport

TOTAL

Processing costs are considered to be the most expensive part the recycling process, although micronisation processes (estimated at 150/t) are included in this figure. There is considerable
tonnages of PVC in applications that have yet to reach end of life and technological developments
is likely to reduce the processing costs of these products. This is application-dependant. For some,
collection and sorting costs can be much higher than the actual processing costs.
Distribution and Commercial Films
Commercial and distribution films are typically sourced from large retailing and industrial outlets,
which provide large quantities of relatively clean, homogenous waste and therefore makes collections and sorting costs less expensive than collecting form a diffuse source, multi-polymer/
product sources.

Lipor
Netherlands
UK

Table 24: Cost of Activities (/tonne)

Collection
Sorting
Processing
140
50
450 - 650
275 - 375
90 - 110
275 - 350

Transport

TOTAL

Material cleanliness has the greatest impact on processing costs; the dirtier the material, the more
washing is needed and the greater the amount of residues that are produced.

EPS
EPS has a bulk density of between 10 80 kg/m3. The high volume and low weight nature of this
waste has a significant impact on the overall costs of EPS recycling, through high collection and
transportation costs. With a large proportion of available waste arising from large retailers and
producers, sorted at source, reverse logistics, i.e. filling returning lorries with EPS waste can help
reduce these costs, as can co-collecting separated waste with other industrial or trade recyclables
and densification.

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WASTE PLASTICS RECYCLING A GOOD PRACTICES GUIDE

BY AND FOR LOCAL & REGIONAL AUTHORITIES

Table 25: Cost of Activities (/tonne)

Collection
Sorting
Processing
IMOG
Plastretur (NOR)
Other EU

300
200 - 250

Transport

TOTAL
330
300 - 1,700

Only clean EPS is usually requested and simple processing techniques are used to produce a granular,
EPS product; processing costs of 100 have been reported. The cost range detailed, 300 1,700 is
not typical of L/RA collection systems. It also reflects private collection initiatives which may
have to establish independent collection systems, however, the overall cost of the system is highly
influenced by the collection method employed.

Legal and Economic Instruments to Promote Waste plastics Recycling

Some waste plastics are currently economic to recycle, however others are not, although they
maybe in the future or need to be targeted now in order to meet national and European targets.
For such waste plastics, support is needed to stimulate the development of recycling activities and
this can be provided by the adoption and implementation of a number of economic and/or regulatory instruments.
The most important of these instruments are reviewed below. However, these instruments must be
introduced with caution, because they can be counter-productive if they are not justified, explained
and monitored. For example, increasing the costs of landfill disposal through taxes can stimulate
illegal dumping.
A combination of the different instruments is often more effective than the introduction of one
instrument alone. For example, the ban of landfilling can be coupled with the introduction of
a subsidy for sorting activities.

Regulatory instruments
Regulatory instruments are strong obligatory instruments, which impose legal obligations in order
to achieve a level of environmental protection/ quality. These typically concern restrictions on
activities which are considered to be detrimental to the environment. For such measure to be
successful, they must meet a number of criteria.
The first is that they should be accepted by the public and the actors concerned, which must be
convinced that the new rules will lead to a better situation. Education and increasing awareness of
the issued targeted are also necessary if this condition is to be met.
The second condition is the effectiveness of the control and monitoring of the new rules. If the
controls are poor and/or the infringement of the rules rarely generates sanctions and/or the
sanctions are not credible, the new rules will probably not be effective. This is also dependant on
the availability of facilities which enables regulatory instruments to be monitored and enforced.

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