SCHOOL OF CIVIL ENGINEERING
CIRCULAR ECONOMY AND RESOURCE RECOVERY FROM WASTE CIVE9831M
REPORT ON
APPLYING THE CVORR METHODOLOGY
Submitted on 02/05/2023
SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE
REQUIREMENT FOR THE AWARD OF THE DEGREE
OF
MASTER OF SCIENCE (ENG.)
IN
ENVIRONMENTAL ENGINEERING AND PROJECT MANAGEMENT
2022- 2023
1. INTRODUCTION
With the rapid development of the economy, plastics are widely used in everyday life and in various industries such as industrial production, construction, hospitality, transportation, and packaging due to their excellent performance. However, plastic waste causes several environmental and health issues. Plastic waste releases hazardous compounds, which are later transferred to living organisms by ingestion, resulting in negative health effects and, in many cases leads to death (Rochman et al., 2013). Plastic waste processed by waste treatment systems can also produce organic contaminants, causing a variety of negative consequences on human health (Tue et al., 2013). To combat the situation, 250 organisations have joined in a global pledge to eradicate plastic waste and pollution at the source, in addition to government actions. In the UK, this is done through the "UK Plastic Pact," a cooperative project run by the charity WRAP. The major packaging manufacturers, brands, recyclers, and NGOs in the world—many of whom are involved in the FMCG sector—have all signed the agreement Plastic Pact (NPE, 2018). The UK Plastics Pact currently includes retailers who supply 80% of the market. Their target is to ensure that new products are made to be recycled. Moreover, they aim to use recycled materials to manufacture new products (Burgess et al., 2021).
The UK Plastic Pact's goal by 2025 is to hasten the transition to the CE with three main objectives: eradicating, innovating, and circulating (WRAP, 2018). The targets for the UK Plastics Pact are the following:
1. Eliminate problematic or unnecessary single-use packaging through redesign, innovation or alternative (reuse) delivery model.
2. 100% of plastics packaging to be reusable, recyclable, or compostable
3. 70% of plastics packaging effectively recycled or composted
4. 30% average recycled content across all plastic packaging.
Moreover, the Chinese government declared an import restriction on solid waste in 2017 which significantly reduced its plastic waste imports, and the UK waste economy got impacted. That year, the country imported 6 million tonnes of plastic waste (Igini, 2022), more than 2.7 million tonnes of which originated from the UK (Partridge and Medda, 2019). The UK exported mainly its plastic waste in China. With this ban coming into force on 31 December 2018, there has been an immediate impact on the global plastics recycling market, exposing a crisis in countries that had relied on exports as a method of waste disposal. However, China's ban on the import of waste plastics has also forced other countries to actively deal with their own waste treatment capacity. UK imports waste to Asian and European countries after the China ban on the import of plastic waste, Malaysia became a major importer of plastic waste from the United Kingdom with a total import amount of 105 Kt in 2018, which was 68% (42 Kt) higher than that in 2017 (Wanget al., 2019).
1.1 APPLYING CVORR
This report will be focusing on the UK Plastics Pact, the comparison of two scenarios between the year 2017 and 2025, assess the impact of the new Plastic Pact and forecast the future. CVORR methodology will be applied to meet the objectives of the report which is widely divided into three major sections- modelling the system, wider impacts, and future scenarios. A seven-step process is followed to deduce conclusions regarding the impacts of the ambitious pact. The following are the steps:
Assess the baseline: Current state (2017) of plastic waste production in the UK and its recycling to be analysed.
Produce MFA: An MFA will be produced using the information collected and calculated for 2017 (see fig1).
Metric selection: The metrics to be included are chosen on the basis of the kind of influence the pact will have on the lives of the citizens and economy of the country. Environmental, social, financial, technical are the 4 aspects discussed in this report (see fig5).
Scenario Development: The UK plastic pact aims at 100% reusability, recyclability, and compostability of all plastic waste by the year 2025. The report will discuss above mentioned metrics to forecast whether the goals of the pact will be achieved.
MFA for scenario: Another MFA will be produced using the information collected and calculated for 2025 (see PART C).
Assign metrics to mass flow: The 4 metrics were quantified to study the mass flow for 2025.
Results: Towards the end of the analysis, compare information from 2017 and 2025 to evaluate the pros and cons of the pact, to weigh and quantify improvements in the plastic industry and the implications it has on the society, economy, and environment.
2. PART A: MODELLING THE SYSTEM
In 2017, the UK created 2.3 Kt of plastic waste, but only 45% of it was recycled (WRAP, 2018). In the UK, there has been a greater awareness of the concerns surrounding the disposal of plastic waste, particularly non-recyclable plastics (Partridge and Medda, 2019). Under political pressure, the UK government has launched discussions on revising its plastic waste management plan. During the last two years, the UK government has launched a few programmes aimed at reducing plastic waste. In November 2021, the UK government published the plastic packaging tax, to tax any plastic packaging (produced or imported) in the UK that does not contain 30% or more recycled plastic (GOV.UK, 2021). The tax becomes effective on April 1, 2022, and it will be charged at a rate of £200 per tonne as of that date. As of April 1, 2023, a tonne will cost £210.82 (UK gov, 2023).
2.1 Material Flow Analysis
MFA is a method for analysing the transformation, transportation, or storage of materials within a specified system, making a systematic assessment of material flows and stocks within an arbitrarily complex system defined in space and time (Allesch, et al., 2015). In this report, any losses and export destinations that occur in the system are assessed and calculated. The MFA of the processes, periods, system boundaries and flow rates of plastic packaging flows in the UK for 2017 will be generated to visualise the processes.
2.2 Data Analysis
The material flow analysis diagram illustrates the flow of plastics packaging waste in the UK for 2017, from generation to disposal. The diagram indicates that the total generation of plastic in the UK is 2361 Kt, this value is based on ‘Plastic Flow 2025-Plastic Packaging Flow Data Report’ from WRAP hereinafter referred to as WRAP 2018. Similarly, according to the WRAP 2018 report based on primary data and reliable market share data, plastic packaging production is 1532 Kt from the consumer (purchased by individual) sector and 820.7 Kt from the non- consumer (purchased by industries) sector.
Once the plastic packaging is produced, it is consumed and eventually becomes plastic packaging waste. Some of this waste is then sorted (kerbside), collected through bring to site and CA sites (other in the MFA; these sites are meant for the public to dispose domestic materials like metal, glass, bulky amenities, etc which are not collected by the local authorities), or uncollected where the waste will end up in the PPPW disposal and recycling. PPPW is the stage at which the plastic waste is to be managed either by sending it to the landfill, incineration, or recycling. The RECOUP report (RECOUP, 2018) shows uncollected waste with 1782.48 Kt. There are 479.57Kt collected at the kerbside (domestic waste sorted according to the material by residents before collection at household level) and 52.64Kt collected through other means- these two values are from WRAP report 2018. RECOUP report for 2018 also provides that 527 Kt goes to a processing plant for recyclable materials called an MRF (MRF1),and the remaining waste is sent to sorting pre-treatment. Sorting pre-treatment is carried out in order to make the recyclable material increasingly more market driven thereby reducing the quantity of waste sent to landfills.
After sorting pre-treatment, the rigid (constituted of denser and thicker polymer) waste was found to be 786.8 Kt, and the films (made of lighter polymers) 276.4 Kt. Furthermore, the sorting rejects with 105.8 Kt also sent to post-consumer plastic packaging waste disposal and recovery in residual waste. In addition to kerbside and other waste, as well as litter in the environment with 37.49 Kt and then about 18.5 Kt into the water body according to the UK Government Office for Science’s Future of the Sea report. From this stage, there are 40.19 Kt emissions by calculation. PPPW disposal and recovery in residual waste has three ways. Firstly, a part of it is discharged to landfill with 234.61 Kt. Secondly, another part is discharged by incineration with 698.75 Kt. According to ‘Evaluation of the climate change impacts of waste incineration in the United Kingdom report 2018’, these two ways result in 2.3 Kt and 975.12 Kt of emissions respectively.
The rigid and film packaging waste goes through the Plastic Recycling Facility Reprocessor. According to WRAP’s information, data on the amount of plastic packaging recycled classification calculated from the Excel: Films with 93.64 Kt, HDPE with 71.92 Kt, LDPE with 23.97 Kt, PE with 5.33 Kt, PET with 98.56 Kt, PP with 50.61 Kt, PS with 5.33 Kt, PVC with 5.3 Kt, and other with 2.63 Kt are separated. All but the exported waste with 698.75 Kt is sent for recycling, 24.79 Kt of emissions during export transported. From there, 61.35 Kt of fossil CO2 released, 22.91 Kt are sent for open-loop recycling, while 37.26 Kt are lost in open-loop recycling and sent back to PPPW disposal and recovery in residual waste, re-run through MRF 2 to sorting pre-treatment. There are 203.51 Kt sent for closed-loop recycling and back to plastic packaging production.
Figure 1: MFA diagram for 2017
3. PART B: THE WIDER IMPACTS
3.1. ENVIRONMENTAL ASPECTS AND CO2
The recycling process willemit greenhouse gasses including CO2 in the environment where there could be direct and indirect emissions. For the calculation of CO2 emissions in the MFA, information was taken from the report of Hestinetal. (2015) and assumptions were made when relevant information was missing. Those calculations and assumptions are shown in the excel. Some of the main assumptions made are:
.The consumer films are assumed to end up in the open-loop and thus they will not be recycled back into the system.
.The PE plastic, the others, emissions were assumed to be 348 (kg CO2 e/t) and emissions for PE virgin plastics 1600 (kg CO2 e/t). For the films virgin plastic production emissions were assumed to be 4800 (kg CO2 e/t).
.Avalue of 33,000 tonnes has been assumed for the energy and heat substitution to calculate the avoided energy recovery emissions (Anglian water, 2021)
.The recycling material generated was calculated to be 56.95% and the virgin plastics generated will be 43.05%.
Figure 2 shows the CO2 emissions in each step during the recycling process. There are positive and negative emissions where the positive ones come from the recycling waste and the negative has been considered as avoided emissions as the emissions that would have been emitted during the production of virgin plastics. In other terms, the negative emissions balance out the CO2 emissions that have been released from the recycling process.
Figure 2: CO2 emissions in 2017 during the recycling process
Energy recovery is by far the highest CO2 emitting step in the recycling process with 975.12 Kt emitted during the incineration process. The least emitting step is the landfilling process with only 2.35 Kt. Overall, the net emissions are found to be 673 Kt for the recycling process in 2017. By reducing the production of virgin plastics, and increasing the recycling rate in following years, less CO2 emissions will be released and the goal of the Plastic Pact for 2025, could be achieved.
3.2. FINANCIAL ASPECTS AND COST INCURRED VERSUS REVENUES FROM SALE OF PLASTIC
The capital expenditure (CAPEX) for this report includes the truck cost and the investments needed for sorting and recycling facilities. There have been some assumptions for the calculations.
The annual growth rate has been assumed to be 1.12% from 2016 to 2017.
It has been assumed that the waste for the year 2017 increased according to the annual growth rate and hence an additional 3 trucks are needed.
The cost of one truck is assumed to be € 80,000
The government owns the recycling facility and thus no extra land rent has been added.
The calculations for the operating expenditure (OPEX) includes the cost of collection, pre-treatment, transport, recycling, energy recovery and landfilling, the average recycling cost of plastics, and the cost of transport to the recycling units, and any other waste management operations. Moreover, assumptions were made such:
The PE processing cost was estimated to be between the HDPE and LDPE cost value as data was missing.
The films were not clearly stated separately, instead they were assumed to be part of the ‘’other’’ in the excel. The overall revenue and investment from selling recycled plastic is shown in the Table 1 below which varies according to the different selling prices from region to region and on the basis of the types of plastics. To calculate the revenue, three possible selling prices were accounted for -low income, medium, and high. Where the revenue if the plastic is sold at a low selling price will be € 199,086,600, for medium pricing will be € 227,560,373, and for high selling price will be € 256,034,145. The net investment for low and medium selling price is approximately
- € 52,614,787 and - € 24,141,014 respectively. For the high selling price, it is € 85,881,508 which is a positive value. This explains that the authorities must pay if low or medium values are taken for carrying out the recycling process. In case of high prices, there is a positive cash inflow to the authority. Figure 3 below depicts the revenue from several types of plastics sold in 2017 in different selling pricing.
Table 1: Revenue and investment of recyclables for different selling prices for 2017
|
|
Low Income (ε) |
Medium Income (ε) |
High Income (ε) |
|
CAPEX |
81628750 |
81628750 |
81628750 |
|
OPEX |
170072636.7 |
170072636.7 |
170072636.7 |
|
Total Cost |
251701386.7 |
251701386.7 |
251701386.7 |
|
Total Income |
199086600 |
227560372.5 |
256034145 |
|
NPV |
-52614786.71 |
-24141014.21 |
4332758.288 |
Figure 3: Revenue for all different types of plastics and different selling prices in 2017
3.3. SOCIAL ASPECTS AND JOBS CREATED
Increasing recycling and adopting the Plastic Pact will have a positive influence in the country’s economy as more jobs will be created and thus there will be less unemployment. The number of people employed could be directly linked to waste management and recycling activities, or indirectly associated with it via supporting activities like building new recycling facilities or producing recycling equipment. Figure 4 shows the total number of jobs created in 2017. Furthermore, based on the calculations done in part A where the quantity of plastics was calculated in the UK during 2017, it was found out that substantial number of jobs were attained. It was found that the jobs were created in several sectors such as collection, sorting/pre-treatment, transport, recycling, energy recovery, and landfilling. Collection being at the top of the sectors created a total of 2435 jobs,with a total mass of 1059 Kt and 23 of (FTE per 10,000t plastic) where the FTE is the full-time equivalent indirect jobs. While the sector with the least jobs was the energy recovery with several 4 jobs, 4 Kt mass, and 1 (FTE per 10 000t plastic). The second highest was the sorting/pre-treatment with 1800 jobs, 106 Kt mass and 17 (FTE per 10 000t plastic). Also, it was noticed that the recycling sector had the highest FTE per 10,000t plastic with 30 and total mass of 36 Kt while creating 1072 jobs in total. As a result, a total of 5440 jobs were created in all the sectors.
Figure 4: Total job creation in the recycling industry in 2017
3.4. TECHNICAL ASPECTS AND AMOUNT OF RECYCLED PLASTIC USED IN NEW PLASTIC PACKAGING
During 2017, in the UK it was calculated that the ratio of recycled plastic to new plastic packaging is 8%. The amount of recycled plastic used in new plastic packaging is 203.5 Kt which is equal to the closed loop in the MFA diagram, while 541 Kt were exported. To achieve the 2025 targets, more recycling plastic should be used instead of virgin plastic to manufacture products. To achieve that, technology will play a crucial role in the future. Biodegradable virgin polymer could be used to make plastic industry sustainable, robots and automated devices could be installed at various stages in the recycling process to keep a record of the amount of materials recycled, expansion of the recycling facilities using advanced mechanical equipment to make the recycling process more efficient in terms of time and energy consumption.
The UK Plastic Pact targets by 2025, are 70% of plastic packaging to be effectively recycled or composted, and 30% of the material in plastic packaging to be made from recycled content. According to those two targets and according to the assumption that both of those will be achieved by 2025, then the MFA for the year 2025 has been shown below.
Figure 5: MFA Diagram for 2025
4.2. CO2 EMISSIONS, COST VS. REVENUES, AND JOBS COMPARISON TO 2017 BASELINE SCENARIO
In 2025, it is expected to notice more recyclables rather than waste ending up in landfills or in incineration facilities. Thus, the CO2 emissions for 2025 are expected to be less than that in 2017. This is shown in Figure 6 below. The net emissions were found out to be approximately -474 Kt as the Highest value is the avoided production with -1783 Kt. The avoided energy recovery and avoided production for 2025 has much higher values compared to the values in 2017 as more plastic is expected to be recycled than the production of virgin plastics. The energy recovery will also beata higher value (1023 Kt) in comparison with 2017 (975 Kt) for the same reason.
Figure 6: CO2 emissions in 2025 during the recycling process
By the year 2025 CAPEX is expected to increase in comparison with 2017. This is because it is expected that the total amount of waste will increase, and thus the number of trucks needed for waste transportation will also increase. Furthermore, the investment needed for sorting and recycling processes also will increase from 0.08 Billion Euros in 2017 to 0.176 billion Euros. Assuming an annual growth rate of 1.12%, then, an extra € 480,000 will be needed for 6 extra trucks which can take up to 15 tonnes of waste per trip, with working days being 250 in a year. Each truck costs € 80,000. The CAPEX has been calculated to be € 177,036,740. By the year 2025, OPEX is expected to increase. It has been calculated to be € 834,416,970. To calculate the revenue, division into low, medium, and high income has been taken, where the revenue for low price will be € 653,391,009, € 742,191,951 for medium price, and € 839,999,505 for high. Table 2 shows the specific revenues and investments needed while Figure 6 represents the different types of plastics sold in 2025 at different selling prices. Here, the net present value (NPV) is negative which implies that the authority has to spend that much amount to carryout the recycling process.
Since the concept of UK plastic pact is entirely an initiative to increase the recycled plastic, thereby reducing the amount of virgin plastic in the manufacturing cycle, it is going to take considerable amount of time for the targets to be fully achieved. The success of the pact could not be analysed by the NPV value since this is only at the beginning stage of this initiative. The NPV is negative in 2025, which might reach the breaking point in the future after further improvements are implemented.
Table 2: Revenue and Investment of recyclables for different selling pricing
|
|
Low Income (ε) |
Medium Income (ε) |
High Income (ε) |
|
CAPEX |
177036740 |
177036740 |
177036740 |
|
OPEX |
834416969.9 |
834416969.9 |
834416969.9 |
|
Total Cost |
1011453710 |
1011453710 |
1011453710 |
|
Total Income |
653391009.4 |
742191950.7 |
834999504.6 |
|
NPV |
-358062700.5 |
-269261759.2 |
-176454205.3 |
Figure 7: Revenue for all types of plastics and different selling prices in 2025
It is expected that the job vacancies in 2025 will increase, as the waste production will increase. Figure 8 below shows the predicted number of jobs created in 2025. The total projected jobs will be 11,523 implies that roughly, there will be an increase of 6,000 jobs in comparison with 2017. The biggest change will be in the recycling vacancies where the number of positions in 2025 will be almost four times more than those in 2017.
Figure 8: Total jobs creation in the recycling industry in 2025
From the MFA of 2025, the two main goals of the UK Plastic Pact are assumed to be achieved. The MFA diagram for 2025 (Figure 5) shows that 70% of the total packaging has been recycled, and at least 30% of the material in plastic packaging is made from recycled content. In addition to that, more jobs will be created, less CO2 emissions will be produced, and investment requirements will increase in 2025 compared to 2017 mainly in sorting, recycling and transportation facilities. In future, the overall emissions can be further reduced by adopting sustainable alternatives like using electric vehicles for collection and transportation of waste, and employing renewable sources of energy to carryout various recycling operations.
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