The special thing about plastic and biodegradable plastic packaging is that the moment it becomes waste for some, it becomes a resource for others. All that needs to be done is to place the product in the correct bin at the time of separate collection, at home and in the office.
Only plastic packaging can be placed in the separate collection of plastics, and through the recycling chain it is transformed into "second" raw material (with similar characteristics to the initial one) from which new products are made. The recycling step is taken after the separate collection phase, when the plastic is taken to the sorting plants and sorted by polymer type (PET bottles, HDPE bottles, polyethylene films, polystyrene trays, etc.). This is because it is necessary to start with homogeneous flows of product types in order to obtain quality recycled materials. Sorting at home or in the office would be complicated, so processing takes place at a later stage.
How is plastic turned into recycled material? There are two processes, mechanical and chemical. In the mechanical process, plastic packaging is ground, contamination (metals, ferrous elements, etc.) is removed, washed and separated by density. At the end, plastic flakes or granules are obtained which will be used as a secondary raw material to produce new objects.
The chemical process, on the other hand, breaks down the basic plastic molecules (polymers) to obtain starting raw materials (monomers). It can only be used for a few plastics and is therefore the least common.
Bioplastics, which are biodegradable and compostable, have a second chance in nature. Packaging should be disposed of in the organic fraction of household waste, and in this way everything is transformed into compost, which is valuable for soil fertility. Thanks to the action of amazing micro-organisms such as cyanobacteria and fungi, which attack and decompose both organic waste and bioplastic, compost is obtained, a soil that can be used to fertilise agricultural land, as well as gardens and vegetable plots.
This natural process is accelerated by man in composting plants, where the organic fraction of waste is collected separately, recreating the optimal conditions to favour the action of micro-organisms. In this way, the bioplastic returns to nature in the form of natural fertiliser.
Biodegradable plastic production waste, if correctly separated from traditional plastic waste, can easily be recycled using mechanical methods, a sector in which Gianeco has been operating for many years, successfully recycling biodegradable plastics such as PLA, PBS, PBAT, and blends of biodegradable plastics.
While for the post-consumer waste of biodegradable plastics, for the moment there are not sufficient flows for mechanical recycling, with the exception of some tests that have been carried out in closed collection circuits (such as festivals, fairs, concerts and other events where it has been possible to distribute disposable objects made exclusively of biodegradable plastics with subsequent collection and mechanical recycling.
There are a number of chemical recycling plants for biodegradable plastics but they do not currently operate due to the limited availability of biodegradable plastics waste in order to be able to operate such plants.
Strictly necessary