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Economic and environmental analysis of composite recycling techniques for the design of future waste management supply chains

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Abstract

Carbon fiber-reinforced polymer composites have permeated every aspect of modern life. Significant progress has been made in engineering communities to recycle composite wastes. While emerging recycling techniques can recover both fibers and resins at mild processing conditions, they are currently limited on the laboratory scale. It remains unclear if they could lead to market viability and environmental sustainability when they are used for industrial applications; if not, what the limiting factors are and how to improve them. In this study, the environmental and economic impacts of existing recycling techniques are studied. The average recycling costs are analyzed, and the environmental impacts are examined. It reveals that while the emerging techniques can recycle composites with extremely low environmental impact, their costs are significant compared to conventional techniques, primarily due to the expensive solvents and catalysts used to enable recycling. However, the study shows that it is possible to combine conventional waste processing techniques with emerging ones to enable recycling scenarios that are both cost-effective and environmentally beneficial. Overall, the study in this paper provides valuable insights for the design of future waste management supply chains and appropriate business models for the sustainable development of society.

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Data availability

The datasets generated during and/or analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

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Funding

The authors acknowledge support from Fundamental Research Funds for Heilongjiang Provincial Undergraduate Universities (2019BJ08) and Funds for Science and Technology Innovation Team at Heilongjiang Institute of Technology (2018cx15).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Economics and Management, Heilongjiang Institute of Technology, Harbin, 150050, Heilongjiang, China

    Xiaoli Jiang & Minghui Shao

  2. College of Materials and Chemical Engineering, Heilongjiang Institute of Technology, Harbin, 150050, Heilongjiang, China

    Buhe Bateer

Authors
  1. Xiaoli Jiang
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  2. Minghui Shao
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  3. Buhe Bateer
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Contributions

XJ contributes to the conceptualization, methodology, analysis, and investigation of this study. The first draft of the manuscript was written by XJ. All authors commented on previous versions of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

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Correspondence to Xiaoli Jiang.

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Jiang, X., Shao, M. & Bateer, B. Economic and environmental analysis of composite recycling techniques for the design of future waste management supply chains. Clean Techn Environ Policy 25, 1659–1671 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10098-022-02462-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10098-022-02462-3

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