Does PET trays sorting affect the sustainability of plastic waste? An LCA and cost-revenue approach

George Barjoveanu; Giovanni Gadaleta; Giusy Santomasi; Sabino De Gisi; Michele Notarnicola; Carmen Teodosiu

doi:10.1016/j.scitotenv.2023.165222

Does PET trays sorting affect the sustainability of plastic waste? An LCA and cost-revenue approach

Sci Total Environ. 2023 Nov 1:897:165222. doi: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2023.165222. Epub 2023 Jul 6.

Authors

George Barjoveanu¹, Giovanni Gadaleta², Giusy Santomasi², Sabino De Gisi³, Michele Notarnicola², Carmen Teodosiu⁴

Affiliations

¹ Department of Environmental Engineering and Management, "Gheorghe Asachi" Technical University of Iasi, 73 D. Mangeron Street, 700050 Iasi, Romania.
² Department of Civil, Environmental, Land, Building Engineering and Chemistry (DICATECh), Politecnico di Bari, Via E. Orabona 4, 70125 Bari, Italy.
³ Department of Civil, Environmental, Land, Building Engineering and Chemistry (DICATECh), Politecnico di Bari, Via E. Orabona 4, 70125 Bari, Italy. Electronic address: sabino.degisi@poliba.it.
⁴ Department of Environmental Engineering and Management, "Gheorghe Asachi" Technical University of Iasi, 73 D. Mangeron Street, 700050 Iasi, Romania. Electronic address: cteo@tuiasi.ro.

PMID: 37419361
DOI: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2023.165222

Abstract

Currently, the management of polyethylene terephthalate (PET) trays waste is still challenging since this packaging affects the consolidate recycling of PET bottles. It is important to separate PET trays from the PET bottle waste stream to avoid its contamination during recycling process and to recover a higher amount of PET. Hence, the present study aims to evaluate the environmental (by means of Life Cycle Assessment, LCA) and economic sustainability of sorting PET trays from the plastic waste streams selected by a Material Recovery Facility (MRF). For this scope, the case of a MRF in Molfetta (Southern Italy) was chosen as reference, and different scenarios have been evaluated by assuming different schemes of manual and/or automated PET trays sorting. The alternative scenarios did not achieve very pronounced environmental benefits over the reference case. Upgraded scenarios resulted in overall environmental impacts approx. 10 % lower as compared to the current scenario, with the exception of the climate and ozone depletion categories where differences in impacts were much higher. From an economic point of view, the upgraded scenarios achieved slightly lower costs (<2 %) than the current one. Electricity or labour costs were necessary in upgraded scenarios, but in this way fines for PET trays contamination in PET streams for recycling were avoided. Implementing any of the technology upgrade scenarios is then environmentally and economically viable, when the PET sorting scheme is performed in appropriate output streams through optical sorting.

Keywords: Incineration; Life cycle assessment; Material recovery facility; PET trays; Recycling; Waste management.