Plastics Pipe Recycling
Product recycling is as old as mankind. Historically recycling was done for commercial gain or to preserve a scarce resource. Metals and glass recycling has taken place for centuries and paper recycling was well established last century.
The recognition of importance of sustainability has cast a different light on the need for recycling. Products at the end of their useful life are now seen as a potential resource for the future. Major consumer goods manufacturers have recognised the need to conserve resources and have developed or are developing programs for recycling their products.
The concept of recycling is not new to the Plastics Industry. It went hand in hand with the development of the industry where in plant scrap was reground and fed back into the manufacturing process. However, post consumer plastics products recycling is relatively new and was introduced in the packaging industry in the late 1970’s for recycling of HDPE milk bottles and PET soft drink bottles. Both of these products were produced in large quantities, easily identifiable and local governments accepted them as part of the regular collection of recyclables conducted for paper, glass and drink cans. Commercially viable recycling plants quickly followed.
Plastics pipes are long life products and current technology predicts a life span in excess 100 years. Studies have shown that fabrication and installation processes generate substantial quantities of scrap and demolition sites provide used material that can be recycled back into non-pressure pipe and conduit applications.
PIPA Initiatives
In 2005 PIPA Board committed to recycling of post consumer plastics pipes and received support from all PIPA members manufacturing plastics pipe. The Board authorized a trial for the recovery of plastics pipes from construction and demolition waste. Collex-Benedict conducted the collection trial at their waste recovery facility at Banksmeadow in Sydney and Iplex at Chipping Norton sorted and processed the pipe.
Similar trials followed in Melbourne and Brisbane and in 2007 plastics pipes recycling from demolition and construction waste established. Initially the projects concentrated on PVC pipes which were cleaned, granulated, micronised and used in the manufacture of foam core pipes and conduits for non-pressure applications. Most of the HDPE pipes are sourced from rural and agricultural applications where dedicated collectors ship the product to Brisbane.
In 2008 PIPA is looking at availability of plastics pipes from the mining, rural and agricultural industries.
In Melbourne
A well established collection system is operated by NWC Nationwide Connect Pty Ltd. Construction site are supplied with collection cages and instructed in the collection process. Both PVC and Polyethyline pipes are collected and transported to NWC site at Epping, a northern suburb of Melbourne. The product is collected from all over Melbourne and on spot basis from regional towns and cities. NWC collects most of the product, but some construction sites deliver to Epping.
NWC is committed to receive and process all available plastics pipes from construction and demolition sites. At the Epping site the collected product is sorted, cleaned and granulated. The granulated product is sold to Vinidex Pty Ltd for conversion into new pipes suitable for non-pressure applications.
In 2008 NWC expanded its operation to a second factory in the same Epping Business Park which is dedicated exclusively to processing PVC pipes. They also leased a nearby holding and sorting yard where waste plastics pipes are sorted by products of manufacture and transported to the factories for processing.
Go to the Plastics Pipes in Construction Waste paper for details.
In Sydney
Tatsysm, a PVC recycler who has been in the business for over 20 years, is collecting PVC pipes from construction and demolition sites. The collected product is cleaned, granulated, micronised and sold to Key Plastics a Division of Iplex Pipelines. The micronised material is converted into foam core pipe where it forms the inner layer of the pipe representing more than 50% of the weight of the pipe.
In 2007 the first full year of operation over 500 tonnes of pipe was recycled.
In Brisbane
PPI Corporation Pty Ltd is recycling HDPE pipe collected from rural and agricultural applications.
Pipemakers are committed to process collected scrap PVC pipes, but in 2007 the availability of PVC pipes for recycling was insignificant. Work is progressing with Waste Management companies to identify potential sources of product.
Reports
Collection and Recycling of Plastics Pipes
The paper presented by Dr Alan Whittle at PIPES XIII on the trial at Collex and Iplex in Sydney, Collection and recycling of plastics pipes in demolition and construction waste stream, has been published after a peer review for acceptance.
It was published in June 2007 in Plastics, Rubber and Composites: Macromolecular Engineering. Vol 36, No 5, pp190-193 under the authorship of Whittle, A.J. and Pesudovs, D. This magazine is published by Maney Publishing on behalf of the Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining and the original source of publication can be found at www.ingentaconnect.com/content/maney/prc and the PIPA paper can be viewed here as a PDF (823 kb)
August 2007
Plastics Pipe Recycling Trial
PIPA has instigated a Plastics Pipe Recycling Trial for the purpose of identifying the quantity of plastics pipes in the waste from the building industry and determining the feasibility of recycling the material into pipe applications.
A comprehensive report has been produced by Collex End of trial report repared by Sydney Recycling Centres in PDF format (457Kb).
August 2005
Plastics Industry Pipe Association of Australia Limited
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