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Automation of Plastic Recycling – A case study

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 Automation of Plastic Recycling – A case study
Kristofer Elo, Julia Karlsson, Kristian Lydebrant and Erik Sundin
Division of Assembly Technology, Department of Management and Engineering,
Linköping University, Sweden
kristofer.elo@liu.se
Abstract
Plastic recycling is an increasingly important issue in
today’s society. The number of plastics and their
variation with additives has increased lately, affecting in
turn the possibilities for plastic material recycling.
However, trends in e.g. Japan show a reduction in the
number of plastics used in e.g. household appliances.
This reduction has been put into force in order to ease
plastic recycling for those kinds of products.
In Sweden, more efforts are put on collecting plastic
for material recycling. The intention for doing this is to
have more plastic material recycled rather than
incinerated and energy recovered. This paper deals with
a conceptual investigation and development of an
automatic plastic recycling plant in Sweden. In order to
reach a recycling plant that fulfills required technical and
economic specifications, a large investigation of existing
techniques was performed. This investigation revealed
many techniques described in research, but also which
techniques that were used by recycling industry today.
The results of these studies became a conceptual and
potential well-functioning material recycling plant for
plastics which is fully automatic. However, the focus of
this development has been to sort out and material
recycle the most common plastics, namely polyetene
(LDPE and HDPE), polypropylene (PP), polyethylene
(PET), polyvinyl chloride (PVC) and polystyrene (PS)
whereas the other plastics have been sorted out for
energy recovery. Having these delimitations, a good
recycling process plant can be achieved.
Key words: plastic, recycling, automation, Sweden,
material recycling.
1. Introduction
In Sweden there are several companies that collect
plastic waste from household and industry, but there is
only one company that sorts the different plastics [1]. The
Swedish government’s goal for recycling plastic waste is
that 70% of all plastic used for packaging shall be
recycled and 30% (49,119 tons year 2007) of this material
shall not be recycled as fuel [2] Because of this, there is a
market for recycling plants that separate plastic waste in
Sweden. It is for this reason a company, IL Recycling AB
(IL), contacted Linköping University and asked for
support in developing a concept of how to separate plastic
waste from households and industries.
IL wished to investigate the possibilities to invest in a,
if possible, fully automated recycling plant that would
have the capacity to process the amount of plastic waste
that IL collects at this time. If the plant gains a greater
capacity than required today, it will mean that IL would
have the possibility to attain market share from their
competitors.
The amount of plastic waste that IL collects is about
200 tons per month. Waste like wood, paper and metal is
roughly separated manually, and then the plastic is sold to
the plant in Sweden that sort it. [1]
2. Aim
The aim of this paper is to investigate the possibility to
create an automated plastic recycling plant in Sweden.
A possible solution should be able to implement both
technically and economically. The goal of this paper will
be to present one or several solutions of a plant that shall
be able to sort, clean and granulate plastic waste from
households and industries.
3. Methodology
This paper contains a literature study of technologies
of the possibilities to sort plastics and other materials,
interviewees with experts in the subject and industrial
visits on automated recycling plants and traditional
recycling plants.
The approach of a project, according Ulrich and
Eppinger [3], is divided in several stages: planning,
conceptual development, design on system level, detail
design, testing and calibration. The approach in this
project is similar but with two differences, testing and
calibration. The project that is described in this paper was
entirely theoretical, and although there were no
possibilities to construct an automated plant do to lack of
time, the possibilities to construct a plant dose still exist.
Because of this, no testing and calibration were
performed; instead, the different solutions were
benchmarked and verified by comparing them to different
existing solutions in the industry.
The assignment to investigate the possibility to
construct a fully automated recycling plant for plastic
waste was performed by three Master students at
Linköping University between June and December, 2008.
3.1. Planning
IL’s aim and strategy and a market evaluation of
plastic waste determined the paper’s aim and
specification. The specifications where based on the
market evaluation. In a discussion with IL, the limitations
and assumptions of the project were composed.
3.2. Concept development
To be able to develop a concept for an automated
plastic recycling plant, the process of recycling the
plastics was divided into smaller sub-processes. Because
of the aim of the project, the main sub-processes were
selected as sorting, cleaning and granulating the plastic.
Concepts for sorting and cleaning were discovered and
discussed. Because of the limitations of this project, the
granulation concept was not explored. The main
inspiration in the concept development comes from
papers and reports found in research databases supplied
by Linköping University. Beside of this, the authors
visited an automated paper recycling plant in Örebro,
Sweden, owned and run by IL. This visit was an
inspiration and model for this project.
3.3. System design development
In this part of the project, the main sub-process
specifications were shaped to fulfill the requirements of
the sub-process in the automated plastic recycling plant.
Besides making the specifications of the plant, the order
of the processes was investigated as well.
To be able to evaluate the different equipment and
technologies efficiently, two different evaluation methods
where used, Screening and Scoring. Both methods use the
six following steps [3].
• Create a matrix that contains the different
alternatives and the different criteria
• Evaluate the different alternatives from the
criteria
• Rank the different alternatives depending on
which who fulfill the criteria best
• Combine and improve the alternative
• Select one or more alternative(s)
• Evaluate the result and the process
Screening is a rough evaluation used for neglecting
alternatives that not fulfill the criteria as good as the other
alternatives. [3]
Scoring is a more precise method to evaluate different
alternatives with comparing to screening, to get better
precise evaluation weighting is used. This method is
performed in the same way as screening, a reference
alternative is selected and the other alternatives are
compared with this. The solution alternatives from the
screening that was selected to continue is used in the
scoring. [3]
3.4. Compatibility
Once the most promising equipment and technologies
were selected, the compatibility was investigated, as the
equipment has to be able to function together. The
incoming material is one of the most important factors,
and affects the compatibility between the equipment.
Because of this, all of the equipment could not be used
together to create an effective automated plant for plastic
recycling.
4. Requirements of the automated plant
The three main tasks of the plant are to sort, clean and,
if needed, granulate the recycled plastics. The different
stages of sorting the incoming waste were selected as
follows.
• Separate plastics and non-plastics
• Separate rigid plastic components and non-
rigid plastic components
• Separate coloured plastic and non-coloured
plastic
• Sort the different plastic types
The different sorts of plastics selected were PET -
polyethylene terephthalate, PP – polypropylene, LDPE -
low density polyethylene, HDPE - high density
polyethylene, PVC - polyvinyl chloride, PS - polystyrene
and other plastics [4]. All producers of plastic packages
are recommended to mark their products after these
plastic materials, and this is the reason why those plastics
are selected for sorting. The organisation that
recommends the plastics to be marked in this way in
Sweden is Plastkretsen AB.
Requirements for cleaning and granulating the plastic
depend much on the customer that will buy the plastic.
The part of the plant that will clean the plastic has to
fulfill the government’s environmental regulation so as to
not contaminate the water or environment [5]. The
amount of plastic that was collected by IL at the time was
200 tons per month, which is the minimum capacity of
the plant.
 Due to a lack of time, the project concentrated on
finding equipment and techniques for cleaning and
sorting plastic. The equipment of today for granulating
plastic was assumed to be able to handle the incoming
material, and was therefore neglected.
5. Theoretical state-of-the-art
To be able to sort the incoming material in the plant
different technologies were investigated, research articles
and papers were collected and the different technologies
were selected. In total, the following nine different
technologies were selected for evaluation and the
technologies where:
1. Infrared spectroscopy – Identification of
material by using infrared light [6].
2. Near infrared spectroscopy (NIR) – Uses the
same technology as the infrared, but only in the
near infrared spectrum [7].
3. Electrostatic identification – Identification of
materials by measuring the materials’ ability to
lose an electric charge over time [8].
4. Flotation – Identification of material by using
the materials’ density [9].
5. Fluorescent markers – The plastic is marked by
a substance/substances containing information
about what type of plastic it is [10].
6. Laser – A laser heats up the surface of the
material, and the material' s ability to conduct
heat is measured, making it possible to identify
the material [11].
7. Vision/optical gray scale – This technology
compares an object against the background and
referents colour to detect brighter and darker
objects. Filters and different light can be used to
identify objects with specific colours, but the
main purpose is to identify brighter and darker
objects [12].
8. Vision/optical colour scale – A technology that
has the ability to identify objects with different
colours [13].
9. Ultrasound – When a sound wave with high
frequency travels through an object, the sound
waves become weakened by the material' s ability
to absorb sound waves. By comparing the sound
before and after it passed through the object, it is
possible to identify that object [14].
6. Industrial state-of-the-art
To be able to evaluate the different technologies from
research papers and see if it is possible to use them in
today’s equipment, an investigation of industrial
equipment for sorting plastic waste was performed. This
was performed for equipment that has the ability to clean
or sort plastics. In total, two machines for cleaning and
sixteen machines for different sorting operations were
found.
6.1 Cleaning
1. MR75/MR110 – Cleans plastics without water
and requires the plastic flakes (30-50 mm in
diameter) [15].
2. KS-WLC300-2B – Cleans plastics with
water/fluid and no requirements on the incoming
material [16].
6.2 Sorting
1. Gassner Retec – A machine constructed only
for separate rigid and non-rigid plastics [17].
2. Rotating disks – A machine with the same
purpose as Gassner retec, mainly used today to
separate different types of paper and cardboard
[18].
3. Flotation – Plastics are sorted by density in a
chain of vats with fluids which have different
densities [19].
4. Centrifuge – Same principle as flotation, but
requires less water; the objects to be separated
must be relatively small [20].
5. Criterion plus – Sorts different kinds of
plastics, requiring some manual labour with
incoming material [21].
6. MSS Vydar – Uses x-ray to sort two different
types of plastic flakes [22].
7. MSS Sapphire – Uses NIR sensors to identify
five of the selected plastics [23].
8. MSS Binary BottleSort – Sorts five of the
selected plastics, but only rigid plastic [24].
9. MSS Aladdin – Developed for sorting plastic
bottles, maximum tree kinds [25].
10. Scanmaster II – Sorts plastics by colour [26].
11. Colour vision sensor – Sorts objects by colour
or colour combinations [27].
12. Photocell – Uses a reflector to identify
transparent and non-transparent objects [27].
13. Colour photocell – Sorts objects by colour [27].
14. MSS Plastic ElpacTM – Sorts plastic and
metal, magnetic and non-magnetic. Requires
small objects, flakes [28].
15. Magnets – Five types of techniques using
magnets were investigated as well. Static magnet
[29].
7. Concept of automated plastic recycling
plants
The evaluation of Screening, Scoring and the
compatibility resulted in two different alternatives for
automated plastic recycling plants, one alternative that is
realistic and plausible with today’s equipment, and one
alternative possible to implement in the future. Both of
the alternatives use the same solution to clean and
granulate the plastics, but the sorting processes differ.
7.1. Sort order
To be able to decide the order to sort the incoming
material the products of the automated plastic recycling
plant have to be known. Plastic that is non-rigid, coloured
or non-coloured, have a no aftermarket more then as fuel
in a thermal power plant or in some other thermal
combustion plant. For this reason there are no interest of
sorting non-rigid plastic by type, the non-rigid plastic
shall only be sorted out from the main stream of material
[1]. Plastic that is of a larger interest is rigid plastic and
most non-colored rigid plastics, this plastic have a higher
aftermarket price. Non-colored rigid plastic that are clean,
no mix of plastic types, are of highest value and there for
of high interest to be sorted by type.
The order to sort the incoming material to the
automated plastic recycling plant is the following five
steps.
1. Magnetic and non-magnetic metal – Magnetic
and non-magnetic metal is separated from the
main stream of material; this is done to prevent
damage the to the plant' s equipment
2. Non-plastic – Non plastic material is separated
from the main stream of material; non-plastic
material is unwanted
3. Non-rigid plastic – Non-rigid plastics are
separated from the main stream of material.
4. Coloured and non-coloured rigid plastic – The
stream of rigid plastic is separated into two
flows, coloured and non-coloured rigid plastics;
a mix of coloured and not coloured plastics
decreases the value of the recycled plastic, and
thus the reason for this separation.
5. Plastic types – Separation of non-coloured and
coloured rigid plastic types, a mix of plastics
decreases the value of the recycled plastic and
thus the reason for this separation
Incoming material
Step 1
Material Metal
Step 2
Plastic Non-plastic
Step 3
Rigid plastic Non-rigid plastic
Step 4
Non-coloured plastic Coloured plastic
Step 5 Step 5
PET, PP, LDPE, PET, PP, LDPE,
HDPE, PS, PVC HDPE, PS, PVC
Figure 1 Sorting steps
7.2. Alternative 1 - Technology of today
This alternative solution of an automated plastic
recycling plant uses equipment that is available on the
market today. The different sorting stages are the same as
mentioned in 7.1. Sorting order.
The first sorting step in this solution uses a magnetic
roll together with a transport belt that separates magnetic
and non-magnetic metal. The speed of the transport belt
moves heavier material such as aluminium and other non-
magnetic metals further then the rest of the material,
thereby separating the material. The magnetic material is
driven towards the magnetic roll, by the magnetic field,
and does not follow the main flow of material
downwards.
The second sorting station sorts wood, paper and
cardboard from the main flow of material; the technique
that is used is called Electrostatic Identification/Charge
Relaxation. The different materials’ ability to electrically
relax makes it possible to sort the material.
The third sorting stage uses the Gassner retec machine
to mechanically separate non-rigid plastics from rigid
plastics. This is made only by the soft and rigid plastics'
different mechanical properties.
To perform the fourth sorting stage, a colour sensor
combined with a reflector is used to sort non-coloured
plastics from coloured plastics. The sensor uses the
plastics'visual properties to sort the plastic.
The last step of the sorting process is performed by the
Criterion plus machine, which uses a combination of
optical sensors and NIR-sensors to sort different plastics.
 Non-metal material
Non-magnetic metal material
Magnetic metal material

Conveyor
Figure 2 Step 1: Metal
Figure 6 Step 5: Plastic types
Plastic material 7.3. Alternative 2 - Fluorescent Marking
Non-plastic material
Ionizing bar Measurement 1 & 2 This alternative uses the technique of fluorescent
Pneumatic markers to perform the most of the sorting stages
system mentioned in previously in 7.1. Sorting order.
The first of the five sorting steps are made by the same
components described in the previous solution, magnetic
Conveyor roll, and the purpose is the same as well.
The four other sorting steps use the technique of
fluorescent markers combined with a pneumatic system
for sorting the incoming material. There are pneumatic
Figure 3 Step 2: Non-plastic systems that have the capability to sort out two different
materials from the main flow at one pneumatic station.
One material is sorted upwards, while the other material
Rigid plastic is sorted downwards.
Non-rigid plastic
Main material flow
Material to be sorted out
UV – Light UV – detector

Conveyor
Figure 4 Step 3: Non-rigid plastic Conveyor

Pneumatic system
Coloured plastic Conveyor
Non-coloured plastic
Figure 7 Step 2 - 5: Sorting
Conveyor 1 Reflector Pneumatic system

8. Conclusions
Both the alternatives for automated plastic recycling
plants work if all the requirements are fulfilled. A
Incoming common requirement for both alternatives is that the
Transmitter/ incoming material should be spread on to the conveyor
material Reviser
Conveyor 2 instead of pressed plastic bundles. Alternative one,
Figure 5 Step 4: Coloured / non-coloured plastic Fluorescent Marking, also requires that all incoming
 material shall be marked in a predefined way, and that the
marking shall be able to be interpreted independent of
which orientation the material has on the conveyor.
The common requirements to spread material onto a
conveyor are possible to solve even today. There are
several different types of equipments that solve this
problem, one of these types is already own by IL and
used daily. Florescent Marking requires that all incoming
plastic to industry and households should be marked. This
means that all producers that deliver plastic products to
Sweden have to mark their plastic. To be able to do this,
there must be a global standard plastic marking.
Both alternatives are technically and economically
realistic and able to perform. The economic difference is
that the automated recycling plant with today’s
technology can be purchased today, and thereby realised
faster.
The theoretical section in this paper treats sorting of
pure plastic i.e. non-mixed plastics. The effect of how the
sorting will be affected of mixed plastics is not known,
and needs to be investigated further.
9. Acknowledgments
The authors would like to give gratitude to all involved
personal from IL Recycling AB in Linköping and Örebro
for supporting this research with knowledge and interest.
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