A system tradeoff model for processing options for household plastic waste

Abstract.

With the "Containers and Packaging Recycling Law", Japan has shown a firm conviction towards the promotion of recycling. Waste can be "recycled", i.e. resource value of waste material can be recovered, in many ways, from material recycling to energy recycling. Alternatively, waste can be reduced or disposed of in landfills. A system tradeoff model is developed from component process technology models of six different recycling and disposal options for household plastic waste processing: plastic pellet production, refuse derived fuel production, oil production, waste incineration to produce electricity, use of waste plastic as a coke substitute, and incineration for volume reduction. These technologies are compared with the case where all waste plastic is land filled. Models based on plant data, laboratory experiments, and theoretical considerations of scale effects and mass balances are developed to calculate the cost, energy consumption, CO₂ emission, and land fill occupancy. The models also calculate the valued products of each technology and convert them into cost, energy, CO₂, and landfill occupancy using life cycle inventory data. These values are subtracted from the outputs of the waste processing models to obtain overall performances for each technology. The overall tradeoff system model is then used to evaluate several scenarios of plastic recycling and disposal technologies in Tokyo.